This thesis aims to summarize, from a computer scientist point of view, the evolution of the automation process in the industrial production, focusing on the last 20 years technologies and methodologies applied in the industrial scope, taking as model the standard ANSI/ISA-95 which introduces the automation pyramid that allows to see the entire supply chain in a hierarchical way. The central topic of this work, on which we are going to pay particular attention, is the Manufacturing Execution System, which is the system that creates the link between the marketing/business part of the factory (ERP) and its on-field production part; it allows to the employees to improve the performances of the production, not only increasing the automation of the process, but also providing to the humans some real-time statistics with the goal to maximize the usage of the factory's resources.