Latest release of company’s enterprise IT platform streamlines adoption of paperless manufacturing while accelerating New Product Introduction through greater process re-use, consistency and global distribution

LONG BEACH, Calif. — (BUSINESS WIRE) — October 29, 2012 — Apriso, the leading provider of manufacturing software solutions, today announced general availability of FlexNet 9.6, the company’s next generation manufacturing software platform that offers much more than traditional Manufacturing Execution Systems. New capabilities offer greater benefits to more widely adopt paperless manufacturing processes. The greater process efficiency and standardization that is now possible also meets business needs for faster, more effective New Product Introduction (NPI) while increasing responsiveness to market change.

To succeed in manufacturing, companies need the aptitude to innovate and the capability to flawlessly execute. Effective execution of these qualities results in the delivery of the right new product to the right market, faster than the competition. Manufacturers operating on a global scale are further challenged to innovate and collaborate across multiple geographies while ensuring consistent production and product quality, regardless of point of manufacture, all while maintaining brand integrity and achieving regulatory compliance at the lowest total cost.

Realizing a Paperless Manufacturing Environment

Apriso’s FlexNet 9.6 more readily supports conversion to paperless manufacturing environments. Enhanced role-based electronic work instructions (eWI) can more easily be updated by business users, without the need for IT involvement. This eWI improvement is especially useful for manufacturers in highly regulated industries including aerospace and defense, medical device and automotive, as it allows for greater process reusability and standardization across sites, simplifying continuous improvement without impacting current orders.

“Paper-based processes cannot keep pace with the rate of change and fluid nature of today’s manufacturers that work across sites with a global supply chain. What typically results are wasted resources, costs, time and effort, severely limiting global process and quality standardization,” explained John Fishell, vice president of product management at Apriso. “When FlexNet 9.6 is implemented as a platform for paperless manufacturing, considerable process flexibility and efficiency can be unlocked, resulting in improved product quality, on-time performance and operational agility.”

Accelerating New Product Introduction (NPI)

Apriso’s Manufacturing Intelligence solution, or MPI 2.0 ( see prior announcement), provides real-time visibility and improved decision support to better enable flawless operations execution. Apriso’s MPI 2.0, combined with the upgraded FlexNet 9.6, provides manufacturers with a better feedback loop that can increase collaboration between engineering and manufacturing to build new products right the first time – at highest possible quality for the lowest cost. FlexNet 9.6 improves the efficiency of releasing new products to manufacturing by improving change management process efficiency to reduce latency between engineering and manufacturing, critical when launching new products. Better linking the definition of manufacturing processes from Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) to manufacturing ensures process adherence to reduce time to market.

Support for Windows 8

Apriso's FlexNet offers a unified suite of manufacturing software applications that lets organizations better synchronize their global operations – within the plant, between plants, and across their product supply network. As a Windows 8 application, FlexNet 9.6 will continue to support Apriso’s strategy of offering seamless integration to Microsoft applications and Windows users by providing an infrastructure for its customers’ mobile, desktop and shop floor devices. Apriso’s FlexNet 9.6 also offers mobile access for Apple and Android users.

To summarize, FlexNet version 9.6 offers the following benefits:

Better support for paperless manufacturing:

• Easier modification of role-based electronic work instructions (eWI) by line-of-business users
• Track quality defects with Visual Quality Defect Tracking (vQDT), a visual digital representation of where quality defects occur for quality improvement ( see announcement)
• Expanded real-time visibility into manufacturing process performance and intelligence

Accelerated New Product Introduction (NPI):

• Expanded business process re-use, standardization and collaboration
• Better change and process management capabilities for continuous process improvement
• Greater linking of manufacturing process definitions from Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) to ease process adherence and enforcement

For more information, please visit http://www.apriso.com/products/flexnet_platform/flexnet_96.php.

About Apriso Corporation

Apriso is a software company dedicated to helping its customers transform the performance of their global manufacturing operations. It does so by enabling manufacturers to achieve and sustain manufacturing excellence while adapting quickly to market changes. FlexNet, Apriso's manufacturing software, uniquely enables companies to manage processes and share best practices across their operations with its BPM platform-based architecture. Apriso supports continuous improvement initiatives by delivering visibility into, control over and synchronization across manufacturing and the product supply network. Apriso serves nearly 200 customers in 40+ countries across the Americas, Europe, Asia and Africa. Customers include GM, Tesla Motors, Volvo CE, Cummins Inc., L'Oréal, Luxottica, Lockheed Martin, Bombardier, Textron Systems, MBDA and Saint-Gobain. Learn more at: apriso.com . Visit our blog at apriso.com/blog .