The piece between the ERP and the shop floor: traceability and MES for SMEs that already have an ERP
For manufacturing SMEs with 10 to 50 people whose ERP nobody opens on the shop floor. Every batch with its history, from inbound to delivery note, without changing the system you have. In production in Padua and Treviso, in development at other companies.
- Two systems in production, in Padua and Treviso
- EU proposal BattWISE scored 12.3 out of 15
- Runs on your server, the code stays yours
A MES next to the ERP is the shop-floor software that records batches, operations, checks and labels and writes them into the system the company already has, without replacing it. Three questions before you go on: when did the last complaint arrive, and how long did it take to rebuild it? On the shop floor, who opens the ERP? What does your biggest customer ask about traceability?
Do you recognise at least two of these?
- A customer disputes a part and rebuilding that batch takes two people half a day.
- Production, quality and the warehouse record the same things in three places, and every ISO or IATF audit costs days.
- Labels are written by hand, or reprinted because the printed one does not match.
- Your ERP is fine for orders and invoices, but nobody on the shop floor opens it.
- You know how many units ship, not how many rejects each station makes, or why.
If you said yes at least twice, what you are missing is not a new ERP: it is the layer between the ERP and the shop floor. It is called a MES, and in SMEs it is usually not there.
What a batch without a history costs
Questions to answer before looking at any quote:
- If a complaint arrives tomorrow, how much production do you recall? The batch, or the whole day because you do not know where the batch ends?
- How many engineering-office hours go every month into rebuilding by hand what happened on the floor?
- What is an audit passed in one hour worth, instead of three days with everyone in the meeting room?
- What happens at the next tender or the next large customer asking for serial-level traceability when the answer is "we are working on it"?
These are the numbers that matter in the comparison. Put the software price after them and it changes scale.
What if every unit had its label, its tests and its history?
Picture the shop floor like this: every batch or serial is born with a QR label printed on the spot; at each station an operator scans it with a phone or handheld, records the step, the outcome, any defect with a photo; at the end of the line the delivery note fills itself with the batches that actually leave.
What changes for you:
- A complaint is answered in a minute: that batch, those stations, those tests, those people.
- Rejects have a cause per station and per step, so they have a remedy.
- The audit report is printed, not built.
- Your ERP stays where it is: master data and orders are untouched, the MES talks to it in read and write.
Two in production, others in development: the same scheme
The same scheme (inbound, batch, processing, outbound, label) runs every day at two companies, in the provinces of Padua and Treviso, and is in development at others, unnamed for confidentiality:
- Waste treatment plant: custom internal waste movements, connected to the industry software that keeps the waste register; every package has its own QR label.
- Timber company (Brescia, in development): bill of materials, production orders, batch traceability per job.
- Battery-pack line, 7,500 packs a year: serial traceability, structured defect events, product passport, statistics per station and per step.
- Metalworking company and industrial mechanics company (in development): MES for jobs, steps and production progress.
- Solar energy producer (in development): MES for plants and production, plus an AI module that sizes photovoltaic systems.
Behind it is a method, not a boxed product: fourteen years of custom management software, code with automated tests and static analysis, delivery with documentation. The code stays yours, on your server: photos and production data never leave the company.
The deadlines that are coming (and that a MES answers by itself)
- 18 February 2027: Regulation (EU) 2023/1542 makes the digital battery passport mandatory for industrial batteries above 2 kWh, light means of transport and electric vehicles. A MES that traces by serial is the base: every pack already has its history.
- Large customers and tier-one suppliers already ask for batch traceability in supplier questionnaires: those who have it answer in an hour.
- Investment incentives for interconnected machines need technical documentation the software produces; the appraisal stays with your advisor.
Once the data is in order, AI modules plug into the MES: visual quality control from station photos, automatic reading of delivery notes and invoices, an assistant that answers on production data. Never instead of people: the system flags, quality control decides, production does not stop.
When do you not need a MES?
I will tell you first, so neither of us wastes time. If you make few products in long runs, no customer asks for the batch of origin and changeovers are rare, the ERP you have plus a shop-floor terminal for quantities is enough.
A MES starts paying for itself when one of these becomes true: a customer or a regulation asks for the history of the batch or the unit (the digital battery passport from 18 February 2027 is the nearest example), runs get shorter and changeovers weigh more, tests must be documented unit by unit. In the free analysis we look together at whether you are already there.
What it costs, and how not to take risks
The price depends on the modules and the customisation, so it is set after you have seen the screens, not before:
- Free measurement: send me a sample batch and your spreadsheets. You get a document with today's numbers, yours even if you do not go ahead.
- Navigable mockup in 15-20 days, €600 to €1,500, fully deducted from the total. If the screens do not convince you, it stops there.
- Fixed-price development with a written quote, starting from 62 ready modules; paid in stages tied to a working demo every two weeks. First module in production normally within 5-12 weeks of the mockup.
By the day, for teams that only want the senior engineer: €850 to €1,100 per day. Custom projects start one at a time, on the calendar.
Contact us: bring a sample batch and leave with a number.
Where are the live cases?
Two systems in production, others in development. The pages by province tell you what is running near you: Padua (waste treatment), Treviso (battery packs and industrial mechanics), Venice (our office, in Noale). The other cases are in the provinces of Brescia (wood), Chieti (metalworking) and L'Aquila (solar energy).