The incredible development of computer technology in the 21st century has changed the way we live. Communications at worksite have evolved from telephone calls, document delivery, and conference room meetings to QQ, Skype, instant message, email and remote video conference. Speed has become the key to a company’s survival. Efficiency and information transparency are the root to corporate management.

PSI began implementing digitalization, computerization and paperless system in 2012. By 2014, we have completed integration of all the systems in addition to ERP system. PSI’s MIS system is a combination of MES and automated operation. We continue to strengthen automation in 2015, allowing faster and higher information transparency within the company and between customer communications. Step by step, we are expanding our automation scope. During the beginning phase, employees needed to get used to the new operation procedures, and management team needed to plan the automated system. Hence, the workload increased. Upon completion of the system update, management team staff soon understood the benefit of the new system. Therefore, in 2015, each department’s need for more detailed automation increases, generating large amount of work for PSI IT department. The benefits of the automation system became more and more apparent as each system update was completed. However, as the system becomes larger, the users are required to remember more information, resulting in higher chances of operation mistakes and problem of departmental coordination.

Industry 4.0 has been a hot topic in the manufacturing industry in the last two years. This is an Smart factory process. Simply put, there are two parts. The first part is operation automation, utilizing robots to lessen the burden of manpower. The second part is information automation: data collection by data collector installed on each facility, instead of by manpower. Then the collected data is transferred the to the information center for analysis to produce useful data. A large part of PSI’s digitalization has entered the industry 4.0 zone. However, there are still mistakes and efficiency issues remained. Industry 4.0’s data production automation consists of a series of actions. When one action is completed, the next action is triggered. We wonder if it’s possible to have the same on the operation management system to create a series of actions. Humans rely on intelligence to modify and eliminate issues created by computer. Therefore, PSI’s planning of management procedure automation will begins in the second half of 2015.

PSI wishes to achieve two kinds of procedure automation: automated information delivery between people-to-people and department-to-department. The other kind is anomaly management system automation, as explained below:

ERP system is a communication system for people-to-people and department-to -department. PSI’s idea of automation is that once the first of a series of action is triggered, the system will run the whole series of actions until completed. For example, when sales department receives the order and enters the needed information into the system, the system will then automatically change customer’s BOM to PSI’s BOM and automatically produce work order, allocate PSI owned material and customer owned material, simulate material deficiency and produce purchase needs. In one night, the operation work of three departments is completed, which decreases communication mistakes between people and departments.

Computer operation often runs into issues related to incompatible programing. When these types of problem arise, system will automatically sends an email to the responsible department. The value of human being is the ability to analyze, make decision and solve problems. The other area of abnormality refers to the tracking of staff’s work operation. For example, when the staff takes a longer than normal time to complete a work order, operation unit will be notified by email. If there is a significant delay, the higher level of management will be notified. This would allow abnormalities to be quickly resolved and not cause burden to the company.

Continued improvement and modification is the key to remain competitive in this industry. PSI never stops to reflect on our competitiveness in order to progress in this unstable time.