Manufacturing decisions are only as good as the data behind them. Yet in many facilities, critical production data lives on machines while quality data lives in the lab—often disconnected, delayed, and difficult to analyze together. The result is slower response to problems, reactive quality management, and missed opportunities to prevent defects and downtime.
Modern manufacturers are closing this gap by automating data collection across both the production floor and the quality lab, creating a unified view of how processes behave and how products perform. When machine behavior and inspection results are connected, organizations gain faster insight, stronger process control, and better outcomes.
On the manufacturing floor, every machine is constantly generating information about how it operates:
When this data is captured automatically, teams can move beyond anecdotal explanations and see exactly where productivity is being lost. Real-time visibility helps supervisors and engineers:
While production data explains how the factory is running, quality data explains what the factory is producing.
Quality labs generate enormous volumes of information through:
When inspection results are entered manually or stored in isolated files, quality teams often discover problems only after defect rates climb, small problems become more severe, and scrap, rework, or customer complaints occur.
Prolink QC-CALC addresses this challenge by automating data collection directly from measurement and inspection equipment. Measurement results flow instantly into structured databases and The Minitab Solution Center, eliminating transcription errors and accelerating analysis. This allows quality engineers to detect trends and variation much earlier—often before defects escape the lab.
Manufacturers that automate and integrate data collection across the shop floor and quality lab consistently see:
Most importantly, they shift from reacting to problems after the fact to preventing them before they impact customers. By capturing real-time machine behavior, manufacturers gain a connected, reliable foundation for smarter decisions—from the shop floor to the quality lab and beyond.