WES vs. WMS vs. WCS
In addition to these systems, there are labor management systems, order management systems, material and resource planning systems, transportation management systems and other systems that distribution centers may deploy to manage the entire operation.
In an ideal distribution world, one would prefer a single software system that could provide all of the requirements for driving an operation. However, no such platform currently exists.
The WES sits between the WMS and the work resources necessary to accomplish the work plan, and it directs both people and machinery in real time as to execute the plan. The biggest distinction between the WMS, the WES and the WCS is the decision-making processes themselves and their timeliness.
The WMS creates work plans and the time to compute a work plan is not critical to the operation. Work can be planned hours before the work is to be executed. The WCS, however, is very critical to time or the timing of direction to control the material handling equipment, which requires real-time direction to operate.
While the WCS is capable of making real-time decisions within its silo of machinery, the operational direction is provided by another system. That leaves the WCS with little operational decision capability and relegates it to execution of a plan.
Traditional WMS computing architecture is not based on making real-time decisions. To effectively make real-time decisions, the system of choice (WMS, WES, WCS) needs to know the status of all of the required resources at the decision time.
Some WMS providers continue to improve the timeliness of decision making, at times referring to “near real-time” operations. However, until they achieve real-time operation across all work resources, the distinction between a WES and WMS will remain.