Toward a Standardized Manufacturing Operation Management Ontology (MOMO): Findings from the NIST Workshop

Published

March 30, 2026

Author(s)

Arkopaul Sarkar, Boonserm Kulvatunyou, Evan Wallace, Milos Drobnjakovic, Gabriela Henning, Ana Nikolov, Saruda Seeharit, Dusan Sormaz, Adlene Rebai, Yan Lu

Abstract

The Manufacturing Operations Management Ontology (MOMO) aims to standardize operational management terminology across discrete, batch, and continuous manufacturing processes. Seeing similar ontologies being developed by the pharmaceutical (small molecule) and biopharmaceutical (large molecule) communities, NIST envisions MOMO as a reference ontology that provides a common ground for interoperability across these community ontologies. Additionally, it is observed that traditional process manufacturing companies, such as those in the pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical industries, are increasingly producing processed and discrete products through batch and continuous processes. Using these manufacturing processes, industries now produce a diverse array of outputs, including chemicals, filters, instruments, and single-use components—a distinct category of discrete consumables. The integration of such products often necessitates accommodating both discrete and batch operations within a single production line. ISA 88 and 95 are widely accepted standards that together include foundational terms for Manufacturing Operations Management (MOM) across various industries and manufacturing types. However, there is a need to rationalize consistency between the two. Therefore, a working workshop was organized by NIST to initiate the investigation for producing MOMO based on the two standards. The workshop brought together experts from all types of manufacturing. They extracted terms from the two ISA standards and aligned them with IOF, then attempted to merge them into a single taxonomy. This paper presents the key observations from the exercise and outlines the next phase of development for MOMO.

Proceedings Title

Lecture Notes in Production Engineering

Conference Dates

July 14-17, 2025

Conference Location

Chia, CO

Conference Title

28th International Conference on Production Research

Pub Type

Conferences

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Keywords

Manufacturing operation management, ISA-88, ISA-95, Ontology, Batch Manufacturing, Discrete Manufacturing

Citation

Sarkar, A. , Kulvatunyou, B. , Wallace, E. , Drobnjakovic, M. , Henning, G. , Nikolov, A. , Seeharit, S. , Sormaz, D. , Rebai, A. and Lu, Y. (2026), Toward a Standardized Manufacturing Operation Management Ontology (MOMO): Findings from the NIST Workshop, Lecture Notes in Production Engineering, Chia, CO, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=960186 (Accessed March 31, 2026)