WIP visibility

The execution layer (typically MES, digital travelers, and associated shop-floor systems) does not in itself make you AS9100 compliant, but it is where most of the real traceability evidence is generated and linked. Its role is to enforce data capture, link materials, processes, and people to each serialized unit or lot, and feed trustworthy records back to the QMS and ERP. Its effectiveness depends heavily on integration quality, procedure design, and disciplined use in a brownfield environment.

Aerospace teams should measure work-order aging with defined clock rules, aging buckets, and reason codes, not as one generic “days open” metric. The useful view separates queue time, active work, holds, nonconformance, material shortages, engineering delays, and closure latency.

No, a Manufacturing Execution System (MES) is not strictly required for predictive maintenance. Predictive models can run from sensor, historian, or CMMS data alone. However, without MES integration you lose context such as product, route, operator, and schedule, which limits root cause analysis, prioritization, and traceability in regulated environments.

Connect the machines that create the most execution risk first, not simply the newest or most automated assets. Good first candidates are bottleneck, quality-critical, or traceability-heavy equipment with reliable interfaces, stable data definitions, and manageable validation impact.