ASophia Asia Systems Pte Ltd (ASophia) and ENERGIZER Singapore Pte Ltd (ENERGIZER) today announced their intention to jointly undertake a pilot implementation of ASophia’s Manufacturing Execution System (MES) solution in the Packaging area at Energizer’s manufacturing facility in Singapore. This follows a proof of concept (POC) implementation of the MES system on the fully automated Auto Shrink Wrap (ASW) line at the same facility in January 2004. The POC implementation demonstrated the power of the ASophia MES solution in enhancing the visibility of manufacturing operations to management. It also showed the capability of the solution in acquiring the vital pieces of information required from production processes in real-time and presenting it in a consistent and easy-to-understand manner, for maximizing the capabilities of the production process and increasing productivity.

The pilot implementation will target the remaining 13 production lines in the Packaging area. This will include automated, semi-automated as well as fully manual production lines. The implementation will cover factory floor dispatching, WIP and resource tracking, QC data collection, analysis and reporting functionality. It will track and report on key manufacturing performance Indices (KPI) including Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE), Total Effective Equipment Productivity (TEEP), Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF), and Mean Time To Repair (MTTR), scraps, process yields etc. The system will also collect Quality Control (QC) data from inspection process and associate it with production shifts, production operators, work-cell, specific products, and specific work orders for complete traceability, analysis and reporting.

ASophia and ENERGIZER are confident that the implementation of the ASophia MES solution will bring substantial benefits to ENERGIZER’s production operations and complement the concurrent e-supply chain project currently underway at ENERGIZER

 Background:

 ASophia Asia Systems is a provider of state-of-the-art software solutions for the manufacturing industry. It was founded in June 2002. Its software solutions are based on technology developed over a 7-year period (since 1995) by a team of European software engineers. ASophia develops and markets the ASophia family of Manufacturing Execution System (MES) Software. ASophia targets the automotive, textile, electronics & microelectronics, food and Pharmaceutical industries in Europe and the Asia Pacific. It has built up a team of strong R&D Engineers, Sales and marketing staff in Singapore to enhance and develop the product and to market the product in the Asia-Pacific region. It also maintains a strong team of sales, marketing, implementation and support staff in France to serve the European market.

 Energizer is the world’s largest manufacturer of dry-cell batteries and flash lights. The Company's 10,000 Associates, who manufacture and sell batteries and flashlights in 140 countries around the world, secure its global leadership. Together they produce 6 billion battery cells annually, powering people's lives throughout the world.
Energizer competes in five major categories: alkaline, carbon zinc, miniature and rechargeable batteries, and lighting products. In the alkaline battery category, the Company offers a full line of products to meet the varied wants and needs of battery buyers.