ABB's solution for Quality Information Management (LIMS) is designed to manage process quality information according to proven lab practices. It addressed two main areas in the daily laboratory management: information management and laboratory task management. The solution is fully integrated with enterprise-wide knowledge management, including performance monitoring, maintenance support, downtime management and statistical analysis.
Laboratory Management requires advanced means of documenting quality information and makes it easily accessible in a transparent way. Providing operations with timely off-line information on the process increases actionable production improvements.
As a solid foundation for direct process and process quality control on a day-to-day basis, it is designed to enhance process improvements and to provide a concrete basis for future product development. Included are functions such as automatic and manual data acquisition, data validation, data consolidation, long-term storage, calculations, sample logging procedures, sample batch handling, sample status reports, work lists, standard and compliance reporting features, easy to use trending and graphing plus options for Excel and statistical analysis.
From a quality management perspective, the ability to make process quality information centrally accessible to every business function is a critical issue. Managers responsible for production and sales expect efficient running of the business. Industrial IT for Laboratory Management is a powerful solution for total quality optimization. The quality information collected from raw materials, process and final products is divided into three different groups:
- Quality analysis to provide timely feedback to process control.
- Raw material and fuel analysis for recording and adapting production quality planning.
- End-product quality analysis for compliance reporting.
On-line collaboration with other laboratories in a multi-facility enterprise is a major cost saving and is nowadays part of most strategies. Sharing analysis equipment between several production, lab facilities and LIMS systems is fully supported.
