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Since their beginning in the mid 1990s, Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) have significantly evolved into more powerful and more integrated software applications as computing technologies have advanced. Their functionality coverage has changed significantly and can now provide a common and single system to support most of the manufacturing execution processes from the production order release to the delivery of finished goods. However, MES applications still fall short of adding capabilities for decision-making tools in very dynamic organisations where adaptive execution strategies are required to replenish the supply chain while dynamically responding to unpredicted change. This article intends to describe what MES have become, present their relationships with other enterprise information systems, and to identify major issues related to MES. We also discuss research areas that need to be explored in order to resolve the increased complexity of execution systems and to fulfil the continuing customer needs for faster real-time response and expanded functionality coverage.
Ugarte et al. (Fri,) studied this question.