Bottom-Line Automation

This newly revised edition helps today’s manufacturing companies face the challenges of a global marketplace where every part of the operation must become more efficient to enhance the bottom line. Based on the results and conclusions of an applied research project of process manufacturing operations directed by the author, Bottom-Line Automation presents an overview of more than 30 years of industry trends, pointing out the strengths and pitfalls of each. The book also explains how manufacturers selected automation technology suppliers for state-of-the-art technological features in their systems rather than for the improvements the technology could offer the manufacturing operation. New topics in the book discuss the economic optimization of industrial assets. Key findings include the fact that returns on automation investments were rarely, if ever, calculated. In fact, accounting systems were not even capable of measuring the performance offered by process automation systems. The author explains a strategy for measuring and improving automation system performance for the ultimate goal—the bottom line, and provides case studies of how such a strategy was implemented in three process manufacturing organizations. The author brings more than 30 years of industry experience, education, and research together in this unprecedented work.