
Manufacturing Execution System Expert
to connect shop-floor operations with fast, precise AI matchingHire experts who configure production tracking, integrate shop-floor systems and improve traceability across manufacturing processes. FRATCH matches you quickly with vetted, available freelancers whose experience fits your MES project.
Meet FRATCH Experts who have recently used Manufacturing Execution System
Alwin G.
Last position:
IT Interim Manager & AI Strategist
- Founder of CheironX: AI-supported GRC management (ISO 27001, BSI IT-Grundschutz, TISAX, DORA)
- Strategic focus on Agentic AI and GenAI for modern IT Governance, Risk & Compliance Management
- IT interim management and strategic consulting
Stefan V.
Last position:
Managing Director and Technical Lead at Building a Trading Company
- Developed business strategy, positioning, and market approach for a new B2B and B2C trading company.
- Designed and implemented the corporate website and online shop end to end, and coordinated suppliers and digital sales capabilities.
Farid A.
Last position:
SAP Data Migration & Data Management Consultant for SAP GEMINI at Montblanc
The consultant's responsibilities/actions are:
- Consulting on the migration of material master & PP Master data
- Prepare Article List template for Cutover Phase
- Implementation of data cleansing measures using individual and bulk changes
- SAP all mandatory fields data extraction regarding Business needed
- SAP migration, Cutover, Testing, BAT, UAT
- Align with the multiple Stakeholders regarding Data from Legacy and SAP System
- Deployed SAP MM best practice (guided configurations, active methodologies and road map for project initiation)
SAP ERP | SAP GEMINI | SAP Fields Coordination | Documentation | SAP IDoc | SAP Integration | SAP End-to-End Process | SAP MM (Material Management) | SAP Functional Consultant | SAP Gap analysis | SAP MDM (Master Data Management) | Data Migration & Management
Martin W.
Last position:
Smart Manufacturing & Production Improvement Implementation at Food & Process Manufacturing
- Identified operational improvement opportunities together with production, engineering and management teams.
- Prioritized use cases according to measurable operational value rather than technology availability.
- Developed solutions around production performance, OEE, quality, traceability, reporting and process transparency.
- Translated operational requirements into required machine data, interfaces, information models and application requirements.
- Defined target architectures and integration approaches for heterogeneous brownfield production environments.
- Moved prioritized use cases from workshop and concept stages into concrete implementation projects.
- Coordinated manufacturing, OT, IT and technology stakeholders during implementation.
- Established reusable approaches to scale successful solutions beyond individual machines or pilot areas.
Alexander P.
Last position:
Software Project Leader for Brake Control Units at ZF Friedrichshafen / ZF Active Safety GmbH
- Project management for software projects in the brake control unit area with a focus on deadlines, costs, and quality.
- Planning, control, and reporting of project progress, risks, dependencies, and work packages.
- Planning and tracking of work packages using PTC Integrity.
- Organizing and moderating customer meetings as well as coordination with internal departments, external suppliers, and third parties.
- Creating and maintaining project documentation according to Automotive SPICE requirements as well as management reporting.
Kyra C.
Last position:
Founder at C/C++ Consultancy for Pharma and Clinical Software Development and Digitalization Support
- Designed an open clinical framework for digitalization in pharma and clinical software development.
- Developed a minimum viable product (MVP) for the framework, applying agile methodologies and rapid prototyping best practices while ensuring GxP validation and HIPAA compliance.
Michael L.
Last position:
Head of IT at Ruthmann Holdings GmbH
- Management of IT with 10 employees, including budget and personnel responsibility.
- Harmonization of the Navision systems in Germany, Switzerland and Austria.
- Connection of the ERP systems in Switzerland, Austria and Italy to the central Microsoft Power BI systems in Germany.
- Rollout of a new firewall at 10 locations in D, CH and A.
- Evaluation of a new DMS.
- Migration to Windows 10 / 11.
- Transformation of 9 countries into ONE Europe.
- Start of NIS2 implementation in 5 European countries.
Max Z.
Last position:
Co-Founder & Managing Partner at DIGITALSINN GmbH
- Leading innovation strategy and the establishment of an AI-native Production System at DIGITALSINN, a content and experience production company.
- Responsibility for innovation direction, AI integration strategy, and production platform architecture
- Establishing a fully AI-driven Production System to transform content operations for brand and agency clients
- Building the strategic positioning of DIGITALSINN as a Production System partner within the DACH market
- Client advisory on AI-native operating models, content automation, and scalable production infrastructure
Harald K.
Last position:
SAP MM, PP Consultant at FRT Metrology Camtek
Creation of Power BI management reports
Environment: SAP ECC 6.0, Power BI
Michael K.
Last position:
Freelance Consultant at Tepo – Gebäudedienste GmbH
- Replacement and renewal of the existing client PCs with an upgrade to Windows 11 and mobile workstations with laptops and docking stations
- Introduction of Office365 with OneDrive use
- Introduction of e-invoicing with DATEV accounting software
- Revision of the standard office applications in daily use
- File storage in SharePoint instead of local data storage
- New authorization structure for users
- Use of Microsoft accounts to synchronize profiles
- Reorganization of the document scanning process with storage in SharePoint
- New backup concept in addition to the Microsoft cloud solution
- Introduction of new data structures: review and separation of data into active, inactive, private, business
- Simplification of processes
- Increased data security and improved security
- Permanent data availability at all internal and external workplaces
Maciej R.
Last position:
Full Stack Developer (Freelancer) at Runbuggy
- Led development of RunBot AI assistant autonomously using LLM-powered workflow automation (React, TypeScript, Java, MongoDB, NATS)
- Architected TMS platform providing unified transportation management and real-time logistics visibility with AI processing pipelines
- Designed event-driven microservices architecture supporting marketplace
- Drove architectural decisions and technical leadership across full-stack platform development
Kusay T.
Last position:
Freelance System & Software Architect - DNA-Extraction Robot at QIAGEN GmbH
- System and software architecture for the QIA-symphony Connect DNA-extraction robot in Life Science / IVD automation.
- Designed features and control logic for extraction, pipetting, lysis and eluate modules using C++, PLC/ST (Beckhoff IPC / TwinCAT 3) and model-based concepts.
- Delivered ISO 13485-oriented requirements, architecture, unit/integration/regression tests and DHF/VEP/VER/TCL documentation.
- Used Polarion, Jira, Confluence, Azure and AI-assisted documentation to improve traceability and engineering efficiency.
Prem Chander A.
Last position:
Product owner for SAP PP, QM, APO, MM, MES and ABAP at Husqvarna Group (Bei HCLTech)
Development and Implementation
- Conceptualization and implementation of the various requirements.
- Experience and ability to collaborate with other delivery teams
- Lead a team of 15 people taking care of matters including monitoring operations, delegating tasks and managing budgets.
- Act as product owner and represent the product vision, strategy and priorities in the area of production operations.
- Work closely with the members of the area including developers, analysts and QA to ensure the successful delivery of logistics features and improvements.
- Lead the process design and lead the build team for the SAP implementation (EU countries) and post-merger integration in SAP PP, QM, MM, APO and SD modules.
- Implemented and optimized MRP Live (MD01N) for multiple plants, improving planning runtime
- Worked with business users to transition from classic MRP to MRP Live
- Implemented SAP QM module, including quality planning and inspection lot processing, resulting in a 20% improvement in product quality compliance.
- Developed and tested custom reports using SAP Query and ABAP for MES data analytics, improving visibility into yield rates and resource utilization.
- Translate production requirements into clear and actionable user stories, acceptance criteria and technical specifications.
- Skilled in discrete, and process/manufacturing (PP-PI) environments; deep understanding of master data, production & process orders, recipe management, batch management, capacity & scheduling, shop floor control, and integration with QM, MM, EWM, MES.
- Worked in Variant configuration (VC)
- Supported international rollouts and transformation projects for SAP PP, QM, PPDS, aATP, EWM, and Variant Configuration within a global strategy.
- Tested functionalities for various business scenarios include interface systems
- Involved in SIT and UAT and cutover activities
Technology: Project Management, SAP PP, QM, MM, APO, ABAP OO, HANA Modelling, FIORI, SAP UI5, AMDP, SAP SD, SAP FICO and S4 HANA Emedded analytics
Ariel L.
Last position:
Sr. Principal Engineer at Slalom
- Held direct line management responsibility for a team of 4 Platform Engineers — owning hiring, performance reviews, and career development — while establishing a shared engineering standards framework and coaching culture that accelerated delivery across client engagements.
- Led a team of engineers to architect a cloud-native voice AI system for a major inspection client, enabling 2,500 field inspectors to document work fully hands-free via real-time transcription and AI agents — eliminating manual data entry across 440,000 inspections per month and reducing per-user cost from $9 to $1. Stack: AWS (DynamoDB, S3, Transcribe, CloudFront, API Gateway, Bedrock), ElevenLabs, Claude.
- Led a team of engineers to automate multi-region Kubernetes cluster management for a global SaaS leader, reducing provisioning time from 3 weeks to under a day and eliminating 90% of configuration errors. Stack: EKS, Terragrunt, Python, Bash, ArgoCD.
- Accelerator - Cloud-Agnostic AI Platform: Architected and delivered a cloud-agnostic, Kubernetes-native platform as an accelerator, enabling multi-tenant, enterprise-scale management of self-hosted LLMs with concurrent deployment of multiple base models and dynamic LoRA adapter serving. Designed production infrastructure using open-source tooling (ArgoCD, Karpenter, vLLM, SGLang) with automated model lifecycle management, API security (Keycloak + LiteLLM), and cost-optimized GPU provisioning.
Bilal J.
Last position:
SAP S/4HANA Consultant at perinco GmbH
Initial Situation: Targeted professional development in the SAP S/4HANA environment with a focus on expanding the SAP PP core competency toward SAP MM, supply chain processes and SAP Fiori.
Responsibilities & Approach:
- Deepening of integrated end-to-end processes between SAP PP and SAP MM
- Expansion of knowledge in SAP Fiori, SAP Best Practices and process design
- Further training in the areas of data migration, SAP table structures and solution architecture
- Deepening of SAP S/4HANA ePP/DS and Demand Planning
- Expansion of methodological skills in the area of workshop facilitation and requirements analysis
Results:
- Expansion of SAP PP expertise to include SAP MM and supply chain processes
- In-depth knowledge of SAP Fiori and SAP S/4HANA Best Practices
- Expansion of consulting expertise for end-to-end processes in the manufacturing environment
Discover over 15,000 top freelancers
Statistics of experts using Manufacturing Execution System
Aggregated from the professional profiles of matched freelancers.
Experience
22 years

Position duration
3 years

Positions per freelancer
14

Top business areas
Information Technology, Project Management, Operations

Top industries
Manufacturing, Information Technology, Automotive

Certification focus areas
Information Technology, Project Management, Quality Assurance
Bachelor's degree or higher
89%
Master's degree or higher
58%
Doctorate
2%

Certifications per freelancer
3

Most common languages
German, English, French

Speak two or more languages
98%
Based on our profile pool as of 26 Sep 2026.
Daily rate distribution
The chart shows how the daily rates of experts in this technology are distributed, based on recent contracts on our platform. Each bar covers a rate range — its height shows the share of experts charging within that range.
Average rates of experts using Manufacturing Execution System
Rates are based on recent contracts and do not include FRATCH margin.
The average daily rate is the mean of all daily rates from recent contracts of comparable freelancers on our platform.
The median daily rate is the middle value of all daily rates — half of comparable freelancers charge less, half charge more. Unlike the average, it is barely affected by outliers.
Calculated based on our freelancers’ daily rates as of 26 Sep 2026. Actual rates may vary depending on seniority level, experience, skill specialization, project complexity, and engagement length.
Manufacturing Execution System experts industry focus
See which industries our matched freelancers work in most often — every figure is calculated live from the freelancers on FRATCH.
- Manufacturing (89%)
- Information Technology (70%)
- Automotive (54%)
- Professional Services (46%)
- Pharmaceutical (36%)
- Healthcare (35%)
- Transportation (26%)
- Education (22%)
Please note that freelancers can work across multiple industries, so percentages overlap.
About the technology
What MES does
A Manufacturing Execution System, or MES, manages and records production activity between enterprise planning and the shop floor. It coordinates work orders, materials, equipment, operators, quality checks and production data in near real time. Companies use MES to create a reliable operational record for every batch, unit or process step.
Core production functions
MES solutions turn production plans into controlled shop-floor execution. Typical functions include:
- Dispatching work orders and routing operations
- Tracking materials, batches, units and genealogy
- Recording downtime, waste, yield and process results
- Managing electronic work instructions and approvals
- Supporting quality checks and nonconformance workflows
Systems and tooling
MES work often connects ERP, SCADA, PLC, historian and laboratory systems. Specialists work with platforms such as Siemens Opcenter, Rockwell FactoryTalk, Dassault Systèmes DELMIA Apriso and SAP Digital Manufacturing, as well as custom applications. Useful standards and interfaces can include ISA-95, OPC UA, MQTT, REST APIs and industrial data models.
When expertise matters
Companies bring in freelance MES specialists during a new plant launch, a rollout across sites or a replacement of spreadsheets and disconnected tools. They also need support when production data is inconsistent, traceability is incomplete or an ERP integration is slowing execution. A specialist can map processes, define requirements, configure workflows and guide validation without losing sight of daily operations.
Delivery and integration
A strong project covers more than software configuration. It includes shop-floor discovery, master-data design, role and permission models, interface mapping, testing, training and go-live support. Experienced professionals understand how to connect MES with planning, warehouse, maintenance and quality processes while keeping data ownership and change control clear.
Signs of strong specialists
The best professionals combine manufacturing knowledge with practical systems skills. Look for evidence that they can:
- Translate operator and supervisor needs into usable workflows
- Design traceability, genealogy and electronic records
- Troubleshoot interfaces across OT and IT environments
- Plan testing, cutover and production support
- Improve usability without weakening process controls
They explain trade-offs clearly and measure success through stable operations, trustworthy data and adoption on the shop floor.
Frequently asked questions
Key details about Manufacturing Execution System, drawn from the questions we get asked most.
A Manufacturing Execution System controls and records production activities between planning systems and factory equipment. It supports work-order execution, material tracking, quality checks, downtime analysis, electronic instructions and product genealogy.
A Manufacturing Execution System focuses on detailed production execution and the operational context behind each order, batch or unit. ERP manages broader business planning and transactions, while SCADA typically supervises equipment and collects process data; MES connects these layers into a controlled workflow.
An experienced MES specialist often understands ERP integration, SCADA, PLC communication, industrial networks and quality management. Knowledge of ISA-95, OPC UA, REST APIs, SQL, master data and validation practices is also valuable.
The right level depends on scope, site complexity and the number of integrations. A Manufacturing Execution System professional should have delivered work comparable to the assignment, such as process mapping, platform configuration, multi-site rollout or go-live support.
Much of a Manufacturing Execution System project can be handled remotely, including workshops, configuration, documentation, testing and integration design. On-site time may still be needed for equipment discovery, operator sessions, commissioning and production support.
Common MES environments include Siemens Opcenter, Rockwell FactoryTalk, DELMIA Apriso and SAP Digital Manufacturing. The best specialist may also have experience with custom MES applications, depending on the company’s processes and integration landscape.
Ask for concrete examples of production workflows, integrations, traceability models and problems resolved. A strong Manufacturing Execution System professional can explain decisions in terms of operator usability, data integrity, maintainability and production risk.
A typical MES engagement may produce a process and requirements map, solution design, configured workflows, interface specifications, test cases, training material and a cutover plan. The exact deliverables should reflect the chosen platform, plant constraints and operational goals.
The average hourly rate of freelancers who have used Manufacturing Execution System in their recent projects is 118 €, which corresponds to a daily rate of about 947 € based on an 8-hour working day.
Of the freelancers who have used Manufacturing Execution System in their recent projects, 89% hold at least a Bachelor's degree, 58% hold at least a Master's degree, and 2% hold a doctorate.
On average, freelancers who have used Manufacturing Execution System in their recent projects have 22 years of professional experience, with a single engagement typically lasting around 3 years.
The most common languages among freelancers who have used Manufacturing Execution System in their recent projects are German (99%), English (93%), and French (23%).
The most common industries among freelancers who have used Manufacturing Execution System in their recent projects are Manufacturing (89%), Information Technology (70%), and Automotive (54%).
The most common business areas among freelancers who have used Manufacturing Execution System in their recent projects are Information Technology (86%), Project Management (83%), and Operations (74%).
Main locations of FRATCH Experts, who have recently used Manufacturing Execution System
Our freelancers and interim experts are at home all over Germany — available on-site in Berlin, Hamburg, Munich and every major business hub, or fully remote. Choose a city to discover matched specialists, local market insights and up-to-date availability.
In Austria our freelancers and interim experts support companies from Vienna to Graz — on-site where your project needs them, or fully remote. Choose a city to discover matched specialists, local market insights and up-to-date availability.
Across Switzerland our specialists are active in Zurich, Geneva, Basel and Bern — working on-site or fully remote. Choose a city to discover matched specialists, local market insights and up-to-date availability.
Countries:
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