Small and medium-sized manufacturers have different expectations than their larger counterparts in terms of their delivery and operational capabilities. Similarly, tools like enterprise resource planning were traditionally thought to be out of the realm of possibility for SMBs due to how complex they were and the resources required to actually support them. However, ERP has significantly evolved over the years to become more applicable in a variety of situations, and smaller manufacturers have started taking advantage of these solutions for their own benefits.

Increased production

Growth is a main goal of any business, but for smaller shops, expansion could be a driving factor in future success. The question, then, is how to get there. What strategies and assets can be leveraged to make this objective a reality? One manufacturer used a cloud ERP solution to help infinitely scale and expand as needed without disrupting existing services, CIO stated. The organization was able to increase its production by 60 percent using ERP tools.

Businesses can use these systems for similar benefits, as well as adding inventory and product lines and improving production lead times. The beauty of this option is that companies don't have to be concerned that their size will limit them. They will have the same features and capabilities, putting smaller manufacturers on a more even playing field with larger ones.

Better insights

No matter what size shop you run, it can still be hard to keep track of all of the inventory and related data without the right tools. There may be significant lag time to access, analyze and act on important data, creating problems with inventory control, supply chain, planning and customer expectations, CIO contributor Michael Nadeau noted. ERP solutions have been considerably improved to remove many of the barriers that once existed when implementing these systems.

Integrating ERP onto the shop floor can provide manufacturers with nearly real-time information right when they need it. Industrial digitization has made this capability a main priority to improve development processes and gain ROI. Visibility can help maximize efficiency and detect any deviations that you might not normally be able to see. With data from the ERP solution, manufacturers can make judgments about equipment effectiveness and will enable collaboration across projects.

"The system might identify a machine running at 3 percent lower efficiency over the past three days and send an alert to the service department," Nadeau wrote. "That drop might not have been noticed if the machine were not connected to the internet with a monitoring solution that was integrated with the manufacturer's ERP system. This is important, because even a tiny increase in efficiency in a high-volume manufacturing process can yield significant returns."

There are a lot of moving parts in manufacturing, but with the right tools, teams can manage their processes, no matter what size they are. ERP solutions have evolved to the point that they provide benefits to a number of use cases, and SMBs can leverage these systems as well for better insights and improved production, among other advantages.