GE Fanuc Teams with SAP to Ease Enterprise Integration, Improve Quality and Drive Productivity

Business Wire, Oct 18, 2006

Americas Go-To-Market Agreement Leverages Proven Capabilities to Transform Business Performance by Eliminating Barriers Between Enterprise and Production Management Systems

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. -- GE Fanuc Automation, a unit of GE Industrial (NYSE: GE), today announced the completion of a sales and marketing agreement with SAP America, Inc., to jointly market GE Fanuc Production Management solutions and SAP[R] applications - easing plant floor and enterprise integration to increase quality, drive productivity, and enable success in key business initiatives such as Lean Six Sigma, regulatory compliance and efficiency.

This new relationship allows both companies to leverage each other's strengths to meet the needs of customers in important Americas markets and in two key industries: Automotive and Mill Products. Other programs that fall under the agreement include the development of specialized professional services in order to support customers with planning, design, and implementation of the solutions.

"The 'Perfect Order' is not attainable without the bidirectional flow of crucial production information, such as production schedules, quality performance, inventory consumption and maintenance status," said Tom Cruz, GE Fanuc Vice President of Software and Services. "By combining and jointly marketing GE Fanuc Production Management and SAP Adaptive Manufacturing solutions, our customers can overcome the barriers historically restricting contextual information flow between the plant floor and the enterprise - helping manufacturers transform their business through increased visibility and resulting responsiveness."

The combination of GE Fanuc's Production Management solutions with SAP's Production Execution services allows for the gathering, analyzing and transforming of real-time data into information to continuously improve a company's level of productivity and performance. The real-time visibility and intelligence facilitated by the combined solution translates into improved agility, quality and efficiency by tracking and executing production operations through a closed-loop information exchange with the SAP Business Suite.

"Connecting plant floor and business systems in a robust way is a critical business issue for manufacturers today because it is the only way to get the performance and responsiveness they need," said Greg Gorbach, ARC Advisory Group's Vice President of Collaborative Manufacturing Research. "The new GE Fanuc and SAP relationship allows manufacturers to implement a joint solution that synchronizes plant operations with the dynamics of the supply network to reduce waste, drive adherence to schedule, decrease product and production variability, and increase quality and productivity on a global basis."

"GE Fanuc has successfully implemented SAP-integrated Production Management software solutions, ranging from single-plant environments to diverse, multinational, global rollouts," explained John Dyck, GE Fanuc Global Director of Production Management. "We have brought these solutions to major manufacturers in discrete, hybrid and process industries through hundreds of installations throughout the world. By working even more closely with SAP, we are helping manufacturers achieve the next level of business transformation."

Traditionally, integration of production data and business systems has been limited to manual processes, or at best, automated transactions that were narrowly defined. By eliminating these barriers, the joint GE Fanuc and SAP solution will improve quality and throughput by identifying constraints in real-time, ensuring "right-first-time" production, managing production sequences, and limiting warranty and recall exposure. The solutions will provide product genealogy information traced by raw material consumption and production performance data. Additionally, they will drive operational efficiency and quality as well as the ability to respond quickly to manufacturing events and trends. These flexible, capable production systems will also meet the needs of companies that typically manufacture many variants of their products and require exceptional agility.

About GE Fanuc Automation

GE Fanuc Automation, a joint venture between GE and FANUC LTD of Japan, delivers automation hardware and software designed to help users reduce costs, increase efficiency and enhance profitability. With solutions and services catering to virtually every industrial segment, GE Fanuc Automation provides a diverse array of capabilities and products, including controllers, embedded systems, advanced software, motion control, CNCs, operator interfaces, industrial computers, and lasers. Headquartered in Charlottesville, VA, GE Fanuc Automation is a part of GE Industrial and combines the diverse global strengths of the GE family with the local presence customers need to design, develop and maintain their automation investments.

For more information, visit www.gefanuc.com or contact: GE Fanuc Information Center, P.O. Box 8106, Charlottesville, VA 22906, Phone: (800) GE FANUC (800-433-2682), Fax: 434-978-5205, e-mail: gefanuc@gefanuc.com.