The Solution

The Solution "HOW IT WORKS"

In the plant, three departments need access to bar-code scanned data: manufacturing, warehouse and marketing. Each, however, has different needs for the data. For example, the manufacturing production operators need a very simple data entry method for the container identification numbers and quick access to summary data like containers processed per batch, containers scanned per Pallet and any bad scans. Warehouse operators need accurate counts of containers and pallets along with the ability to manually update records.

As with the old system, containers and pallets are scanned at filling, shipping, receiving, and return. Warehouse supervisors need access to summary data about the operation, for example, how many clean containers are available, what’s the history of this container’s use and how many containers are presently assigned to what product.

Marketing personnel handle container returns and credit each customer with the appropriate deposit amount. They also reference the container/pallet and batch/lot information to identify what containers belong to each batch/lot.

At any given time, a supervisor, operator, or marketing employee can log-in (depending on his/her level of security clearance) and executed transactions or generate a report. Each department can then use this information or share it with others. For instance, a daily report is automatically generated and sent to Bayer’s corporate mainframe in Pittsburgh.

The success of the integrated system means several other bar code applications, as well as application integration opportunities are being evaluated at Bayer.

The right integration tools have made the collected bar code data available to a multitude of departments. The system was so successful, the company has expanded it to other production lines.