Connecting OEE ERP MES is no longer a luxury reserved for large industrial groups. You already monitor your OEE on a daily basis, but this data remains compartmentalized. Meanwhile, your ERP systems plan without knowing the actual status of the lines. Your Manufacturing Execution System (MES) compiles reports with a time lag of several hours. And your CMMS intervenes after the fact, without anticipation.
Integrating your OEE system with your existing tools is not a pharaonic IT project. It’s a logical step towards transforming isolated data into collective intelligence, thanks to real-time data.
Why does OEE-ERP-MES integration improve industrial performance?
Eliminate discrepancies between field production and management
The problem in many plants is not the lack of data, but its fragmentation. OEE is tracked in one system. Production orders are managed in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). Maintenance operations are traced in the CMMS. As a result, each department works with its own version of reality, often several hours out of sync.
The complementarity between MES and ERP becomes obvious when you connect OEE monitoring. Everyone looks at the same indicators, at the same time. No more double data entry between the workshop and the office. This flow automation improves decision-making at all levels.
Making ERP systems smarter with OEE data
The objective of a successful integration is not to add new software. It’s to get the information flowing where it needs to go. Your ERP already handles planning and finance. Your Manufacturing Execution System already controls manufacturing operations. By providing them with real-time data from the field, you give them the means to do their jobs better.
An ERP system that receives OEE data in real time can automatically adjust delivery times and optimize inventory management. An MES system that knows actual performance can optimize production processes. This interconnection creates value without adding complexity, boosting a company’s competitiveness.
Essential Manufacturing Execution flows between field and management software
From field to system: real-time performance monitoring
Your performance monitoring system continuously collects production data: actual production rates, machine stoppages, scrap, changeovers. This information must be fed back into your management systems to feed three critical efficiency-boosting areas.
For ERP, performance data enables planning to be adjusted in line with actual capacity. If a line is running at 65% OEE instead of the 85% forecast, Enterprise Resource Planning software can recalculate lead times, reallocate orders, or alert the sales department before the delay becomes a customer problem.
In the Manufacturing Execution System, performance analysis and quality indicators feed into process optimization. The system can identify which products generate the most scrap, and which manufacturing sequences are the most efficient. Complete traceability of production processes becomes possible.
Availability data feeds maintenance strategy into CMMS. Equipment that degrades OEE becomes a priority. Maintenance resource management becomes predictive rather than reactive.
From management systems to the field: automation of instructions
Integration also works the other way round. Your ERP sends production orders with their bills of materials, theoretical production rates and quality requirements. This information arrives directly on the shop floor screens, with no re-keying.
The Manufacturing Execution System transmits operating ranges, work instructions and control criteria. The production monitoring system guides the operator step by step, checking conformity in real time, and blocking deviations before they generate non-conformities. Productivity improves naturally.
Integration methods: APIs and standard connectors
Industrial PLC: the modern solution for connecting MES and ERP
An API (Application Programming Interface) is a software bridge that enables two systems to communicate directly. Your OEE solution exposes its data via an API. Your ERP or MES interrogates this API to retrieve the information it needs. No intermediate files. No manual export. Data flows automatically.
Modern APIs use web standards (REST, JSON) that facilitate interconnection without heavy development. TEEPTRAK offers documented APIs that connect in just a few days to the main ERP systems on the market: SAP, Oracle, Sage, Divalto, or MES systems such as Epicor, Infor or Plex.
Native connectors: plug and play with current systems
For the most widespread ERP and Manufacturing Execution Systems, OEE solution publishers are developing native connectors. These pre-configured modules automatically manage data synchronization in line with market best practice.
This approach drastically reduces implementation times. Where custom integration can take several weeks, a native connector can be deployed in a matter of days. Parameterization is limited to defining the relevant flows: which data, how often, with which controls.
Middleware: the orchestrator for complex environments
In some plants, the IT ecosystem includes numerous legacy systems. An old SCADA system, a proprietary MES with no modern API, a customized ERP. In these cases, middleware can play the role of orchestrator.
The middleware collects data from different sources, transforms it into the format expected by each system, and manages queues to avoid losses. This layer of abstraction protects your business systems from technical evolutions.
How to successfully integrate an OEE-ERP-Manufacturing Execution System?
Start with production processes, not technology
The first mistake is to launch an integration project by technical means. The result: you create data flows that serve no one, or worse, that disrupt your teams.
Start by mapping your business processes. How does the planning-production-reporting loop work today? Who captures what, where, when? What information is missing to make better decisions?
This analysis reveals the priority flows. Perhaps your real problem isn’t the ERP-OEE connection, but the lack of non-conformance feedback to the MES quality system. By starting from the business need, you invest where the impact is greatest.
Move forward in stages, validate quickly
An integration project that aims to connect everything at once takes months and generates frustration. Teams wait a long time before seeing any benefits.
Use an iterative approach. Identify a critical flow – for example, the automatic forwarding of production orders from the ERP to the shop floor. Deploy this interconnection on a pilot line. Measure the impact: time savings, error reduction.
Once this first flow has been stabilized, move on to the next: OEE data transmission to ERP for reliable planning, then connection with CMMS to anticipate maintenance requirements. Each step adds value.
Involve users from the outset
The best technical integrations fail if users don’t adopt them. An operator who doesn’t trust the system will continue to record his stops on paper.
Involve your field teams and support departments right from the scoping phase. What do they expect from this interconnection? What are their constraints? Their feedback will help you design flows that fit naturally into their routines.
Train them on the new information organization. Explain why the OEE now goes back into the ERP. Show how the sales department can use this data to set realistic deadlines. When users see the overall coherence, they become actors of change.
TEEPTRAK: integration designed for operational use
TEEPTRAK has built its production tracking solution with interconnection at the heart of its architecture. Open APIs enable the platform to be connected to the main ERP systems (SAP, Oracle, Sage, Divalto, Cegid) and Manufacturing Execution Systems (Epicor, Infor, Plex) without the need for heavy specific development.
This approach favors operational simplicity. No intermediate server to maintain. No complex synchronization to manage. Data flows directly between systems according to configurable business rules.
This native integration enables manufacturers such as Thales, Safran and Nutriset to pilot their production with a unified vision thanks to real-time data. Production orders arrive automatically on the shop floor. Actual performance feeds ERP planning. Maintenance alerts trigger preventive action.
Connecting the OEE to an ERP or MES is not an IT project. It’s an industrial performance project based on the intelligent circulation of data. With the right tools and the right method, this integration can be deployed in just a few weeks, transforming the way you manage production over the long term.
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