Atachi Systems
Cloud-Based MES Platform for Manufacturing Companies

There is a wide variety of manufacturing execution systems (MESs) on the market today and they represent varying degrees of complexity. This makes these systems difficult to deploy and it is often challenging for a manufacturing company to get a good ROI on their capital investments. Atachi Systems’ NGIMES was created to streamlinethe MES deployment process. As Mekala Rao, President of Atachi Systems, explains, “We started our company to build the next generation MES solution to solve the perplexities with the current MES solutions in the market and bring best value faster to manufacturers.”

In addition, the MESs currently in use are not satisfying the needs of today’s manufacturers because they do not provide an integrated view of the manufacturing process. Computer system validation takes a lot of time and these systems are very expensive. Manufacturers have to combine many different systems, such as one for quality (QMS), one for documenting Standard Operating Procedures (DMS), and automated data collection (Historians), to provide the best snapshot of the organization in terms of KPIs (OEE). They don’t have a single system that can project views from different functionalities.

Atachi’s platform is different because it is run entirely in the cloud environment. “What we have done is replaced the capital expenditure (CAPEX) model with the operational expenditure model (OPEX) by going to the SaaS model, so they don’t have to spend anything in infrastructure,” says Rao. Validation time is cut multifold and manufacturers no longer have to spend thousands of dollars on infrastructure and wait several months for it to be deployed. When it comes to scaling the enterprise, it’s just a matter of a couple of days, rather than weeks or months.

We have the capability as a company to build end-to-end solutions around the SAP HANA cloud platform

There is also a data management aspect to this,a single platform for the middle layer, where all the processes and execution systems are managed. The Atachi System provides real-time insight into the manufacturing process, which streamlines the collection and analysis of big data. This helps Atachi customers expand their market, reach out to their customers, and work in line with product expectations. Rao says, “We have leveraged all the current technologies, such as the cloud, big data, and social media. Leveraging the cloud is what sets us apart. Others have leveraged bits and pieces of the cloud, but not its full capability.”

Atachi’s ultimate goal is to provide customers with highest security, lower cost, 100 percent uptime, 100 percent compliance, and no scalability problems by providing one single integrated management system to improve productivity. “I always look for a single, integrated vision of anything that we do,” says Rao. The end result is improving manufacturing from the system perspective, the maintenance perspective, environment, compliance perspective and the processes perspective. Atachi’s strategy is to ensure the software is in alignment with the manufacturer’s processes so the customer can adopt the system quickly and get the utmost value from the system.

In the future, Atachi would like to expand outside of the three countries in which they currently operate, the U.S., Canada, and India, and become a prominent global MES player. In terms of product, Atachi is ultimately working on solutions for hospitals and patients, who are the customers of medical device and pharmaceutical manufacturers. For example, if Atachi’s medical device manufacturers can open up a dialogue with the hospitals, it will enhance their customers’ experience. Rao sums it up, “It’s about connecting the medical device manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies with the hospitals.”