Lighthammer and webMethods form alliance

The push to integrate more real-time plant floor data with enterprise level systems to enhance supply chain performance is beginning to show itself not just in new product capabilities and/or introductions, but in business partnerships. A recent example can be found in the agreement between Lighthammer Software Development Corp. and webMethods.

The push to integrate more real-time plant floor data with enterprise level systems to enhance supply chain performance is beginning to show itself not just in new product capabilities and/or introductions, but in business partnerships. A recent example can be found in the agreement between Lighthammer Software Development Corp . and webMethods . The agreement states that Lighthammer will provide plant floor data access, through its Illuminator product, to customers using the webMethods Integration Platform. The alliance will allow manufacturing companies to access the automation and control systems that run shop floor operations, and distribute information about operational status to all systems connected through the webMethods Integration Platform.

”A natural evolution of the Illuminator strategy at many customer sites is in integrating shop floor data across the enterprise,” says Stephen Cloughley, VP Business Development at Lighthammer. ”Only when the shop floor can freely exchange information with ERP, CRM, and other business systems can latency be eliminated, and the enterprise become real-time in its behavior.”

Lighthammer says its Illuminator product enables real-time visibility to manufacturing performance and supply chain execution, and is currently in use at more than 300 sites worldwide.

—David Greenfield, Editorial Director, [email protected]