Manufacturing operations is the software layer between the ERP that decides what to make and the controllers that run each machine. It tracks every order, every machine and every defective piece. The shop floor is the part of a factory where things are actually made.
A factory runs on software at three levels. At the top, the ERP holds the customers' orders and the stock of materials, and decides what the factory should make. At the bottom, the control systems run each machine. In the middle, shop-floor software follows how the making is going. It is the only layer that knows, at this moment, which order is on which machine.
This zone has three products. A manufacturing execution system (MES) tracks each order through each machine and keeps the record that traces a batch back. OEE and machine monitoring shows whether each machine is running or stopped, and why. Industrial edge computing connects to machines of every maker and age and turns their signals into data that other software can use.
Without this layer, the picture is poor. The ERP knows only that an order was due and that stock was used. The control room knows only the state of a machine at this moment. Neither knows how many good pieces an order has made so far, or why it is late. In many plants the shift supervisor writes the counts on paper, and an office employee types them into the ERP the next day. By then, a problem that began in the first hour has run all shift.
Take a packet of biscuits. It carries a batch number and a date. If a fault is found later, the maker can find out from the shop-floor records which line made the packet, on which shift, and from which lot of flour. That is traceability.
Much of this software comes from smaller companies that serve one industry, and several of them are Indian. It is also the layer where industrial IoT and edge computing are used first, because the machines are of many makers and ages.