Integration infrastructure requirements for agile manufacturing systems

Current approaches to the design and construction of enterprise systems lead to fixed inter-dependences between valuable resources. This constrains resource reuse and the agility of systems, often preventing close alignment between system behaviour and business process requirements. This paper describes the important role that software-based integration infrastructures and integration structures can play respectively in supporting and organizing system behaviour in a way that facilitates system extension and change. Also described are different types of reusable software component and their infrastructural needs. These components are likely to become common building blocks of next-generation agile manufacturing systems. The paper illustrates the concepts described by reporting on research in the MSI Research Institute which is producing proof-of-concept agile manufacturing systems in collaboration with UK end user and vendor companies.