Press Presse Prensa. Logistics and Assembly Systems. For the Trade Press Nuremberg/Offenbach, Germany June 9, 2005 Siemens L&A Talks Europe 2005

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1 Press Presse Prensa Logistics and Assembly Systems For the Trade Press Nuremberg/Offenbach, June 9, 2005 Siemens L&A Talks Europe 2005 Siemens L&A tears down the walls with LMES: LES and MES with standard system architecture for comprehensive tracking & tracing in logistics and production environments The Siemens Logistics and Assembly Systems Group (L&A) is tearing down the walls between LES (Logistics Execution Systems) and MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) and thereby offers an end-to-end system architecture in logistics (LMES) with seamless connectivity to all production processes. By integrating the relevant data from each transport service provider, comprehensive tracking & tracing is available all along the supply chain. While integration in logistics and production processes continues unabated on the ground, the two system environments LES and MES are still viewed as separate entities. With its new, universal system architecture based on Simatic IT from Siemens Automation and Drives (A&D), L&A is offering logistics and industrial customers a system by which all processes ranging from incoming logistics and production control to outbound logistics as well as distribution can be connected seamlessly. Thus both system worlds merge to form a standardized process environment, the Logistics and Manufacturing Execution System (LMES). 1 / Nuremberg,

2 Formal requisites for controlling material and information flows throughout the entire production process are well known: on the one hand there is the chain of control from order allocation at company management level (ERP - Enterprise Resource Planning) through to material flow management and production control at machine and conveyor systems level, i.e. vertical integration. On the other hand, there is horizontal integration along the process chain stretching from raw materials to the distribution of the finished goods. Up to now most users have tried to control the information flow in each logistics and production subprocess with a number of separate systems and island solutions. Typically, data is exchanged across individually defined interfaces with all the problems that go with throughput rates and user friendliness, as well as data communications stability. The integration of different system suppliers leads to losses at operational boundaries and interfaces and to steeper service costs. For some time now Simatic IT has been deployed by Siemens A&D for factory automation as a standard system architecture at the MES level. Seamless connection from the ERP level to Industrial Ethernet and Profibus at the PLC level with Simatic controllers and drives is standard practice for many industrial customers. Siemens L&A now offers extra benefits for customers who want to integrate and link their production process with front-end and back-end logistics processes. This is why L&A has designed its IT system architecture for LES so that it can also be applied to Simatic IT. The benefits for customers are obvious: all intralogistics processes from the warehouse control of unfinished parts, semi-finished and finished goods, control of all incoming and outgoing material streams, the order picking operation and distribution are all harmonized with the production process. This paves the way for comprehensive tracking & tracing (T&T). T&T is the key to top quality and transparency across the entire process chain all the way from suppliers to customers. More and more industrial sectors have to track, trace and log all the goods they produce. Traceability serving quality assurance is particularly in focus now. The call for traceability is getting louder all the 2 / Nuremberg,

3 time: traceability in the food industry from raw material suppliers to the end consumer in line with EU Directives 43 and 178; complying with legislation governing the common storage of materials and product liability issues in the chemical industry; or for maximum quality assurance for high-tech mass-produced goods in the consumer electronics and automotive industries, where costly product recalls are sometimes inevitable. The L&A IT architecture is based primarily on Simatic IT. The Production Modeller for describing the production model, the Production Order Manager or the Material Manager that are now supplied with logistics data online. The layered Simatic IT Library solution with its standard and sector-specific library modules strikes a good balance between cost-effective standards and customized solutions. Customer-specific requirements can be mapped in separate, dedicated libraries that offer the user maximum openness for connecting process-wide applications such as laboratory, testing or QM systems. Document control that can be standardized and uniform data communications within logistics and production processes are further elements for configuring a universal LMES system landscape. The Siemens industrial business organization thus offers its customers a complete system world from a single source for effective logistics and factory automation. The Siemens Logistics and Assembly Systems Group (L&A), based in Nuremberg/, is the world's leading supplier of logistics and factory automation equipment. As a systems integrator, L&A supplies the whole range of products and services, from individual products and systems right up to complete turnkey facilities as a general contractor. L&A consists of four divisions: Distribution and Industry, Airport Logistics, Postal Automation and Electronics Assembly Systems. The company, with some 10,000 employees worldwide, has a business volume of around 2.5 billion euros. For more information about Siemens L&A go to 3 / Nuremberg,

4 The Siemens Logistics and Assembly Systems Group (L&A) is tearing down the walls between LES (Logistics Execution Systems) and MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) and thereby offers an end-to-end system architecture in logistics (LMES) with seamless connectivity to all production processes. The Siemens Logistics and Assembly Systems Group (L&A) is tearing down the walls between LES (Logistics Execution Systems) and MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) and thereby offers an end-to-end system architecture in logistics (LMES) with seamless connectivity to all production processes. 4 / Nuremberg,

5 The pictures to accompany this press release are available on the Internet at: This Press Release is also available on the Internet at: 5 / Nuremberg,