Essex Junction, VT802-335-2662dkoran@davidkoran.com
DK
David Koran& Associates
Manufacturing & Operational Technology

Plant-floor systems fail differently, because production cannot stop.

Implementing technology in a manufacturing operation is not the same as implementing it in an office. The systems touch production, quality records, equipment, and people working shifts. This practice implements and integrates manufacturing and operational technology inside running plants, including aerospace and other regulated environments, and has done so for years.

The Systems

The technology stack of a modern plant.

The work covers the systems that run production and prove it ran correctly, and the integration between them, which is where most manufacturing technology projects actually struggle.

ERP

Implementation, configuration, and integration of enterprise resource planning in manufacturing operations: items, BOMs, routings, inventory, purchasing, costing, and the shop-floor transactions that keep the system honest.

MES

Manufacturing execution systems that schedule, track, and record production: work orders, operations, traceability, machine and operator data, and the ERP integration that decides whether the two systems agree.

QMS

Quality management systems for document control, nonconformances, corrective action, inspection, training records, and supplier quality, implemented so the quality team runs the system rather than the system running the quality team.

AI Inspection & Machine Vision

Deployment of AI-enabled inspection and computer-vision systems on production and quality lines, including acceptance criteria, edge cases, comparison against human inspectors, and the evidence that supports trusting the system. Direct experience in aerospace quality applications.

Production Data & Integration

Getting data out of machines, lines, historians, and legacy databases and into the systems that need it: interfaces, middleware, reporting, and the unglamorous mapping work that integration projects live or die on.

Industrial Cybersecurity

Implementing plant technology with security in the design rather than bolted on afterward: network segmentation, remote access, vendor connectivity, and OT practices drawn from years of industrial cybersecurity assessment work.

Why Manufacturing Is Different

Five realities of plant-floor implementation.

01

Production cannot stop for the project

Cutover plans, testing windows, and training schedules have to work around shifts, orders, and customer commitments. Implementation in a plant is choreography, and the consultant has to respect the operation's rhythm rather than expect the operation to respect the project plan.

02

The IT and OT boundary is never clean

The network diagram says business systems and plant systems are separate. The plant says otherwise. Knowing how to work on both sides of that boundary, safely, is a precondition for manufacturing technology work.

03

Records carry regulatory and customer weight

In aerospace, defense, and other regulated production, quality and traceability records are contractual evidence. System changes that touch those records have to be implemented with validation, documentation, and an audit trail, not just configured until they work.

04

Adoption happens on the floor

A system operators route around is a failed implementation regardless of what the acceptance report says. Training, workflow fit, and listening to the people who run the line are implementation tasks, not soft extras.

05

The plant will surprise you

A vendor never knows exactly what its customer's facility will present: legacy equipment, undocumented databases, a network nobody owns, a process that differs from the SOP. Field implementation requires someone technically broad enough to handle what the plant actually throws at the project.

This is the environment the practice knows best. Years of onsite work in manufacturing plants, including aerospace quality and AI inspection work and industrial cybersecurity assessments in regulated defense environments, mean the consultant walking your customer's floor has walked floors like it before.
Regulated Environments

Implementation experience where compliance is not optional.

The practice maintains an active advisory background in regulated-environment cybersecurity and compliance, including CMMC and NIST SP 800-171 for defense contractors, maritime cybersecurity, and AI governance. For implementation clients, that background means deployments in regulated plants are handled by someone who understands why the rules exist and what evidence the customer must retain.

Get In Touch

Discuss a Project

Inquiries may involve an ERP, MES, or QMS deployment, an AI inspection system, plant data integration, or implementation work in a regulated production environment. I respond personally to every inquiry, usually within one business day.

Essex Junction, Vermont  ·  United States and international travel welcomed