The Intelligent Manufacturing Systems (IMS) program is an industry-led, global, collaborative research and development program established to develop the next generation of manufacturing and processing technologies. The Digital Factory Project (DIFAC) is an IMS project with the aim to develop a strategic planning design tool that is capable of supporting the construction of a digital factory. DIFAC takes into account numerous design factors, including machine selection & layout design, ergonomics for human safety, manufacturing process planning & management, plant design, production scheduling, enterprise resource planning, quality management, 3-D visualization and communications, and digital factory simulation. The immediate goal of this project is to improve significantly human motion and task analysis tools when compared with the commercially available digital manufacturing tools, in order to enhance human safety. The partners of this IMS DIFAC project are Korea, Japan, the European Community and Switzerland. For more information please visit:
Intelligent Manufacturing Systems (IMS): http://www.ims.org
Korean IMS Project: http://www.difac.re.kr
EU IMS project: http://www.difac.net

The Swiss DiFac will cover WP4 dealing with the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) proposing a new Industrial Engineering System that should not only integrate Information and Knowledge from the Production process but the complete Product Life Cycle (PLC). The four Swiss DIFAC objectives are:
1. Implement an integrated company wide information management system,
2. Develop a new ERP-human simulation interface to optimise the production process,
3. Explore the RFID technology integration with the ERP,
4. Develop an e-learning platform to disseminate the project results to other Swiss SMEs.