Executive Summary

You are Happy: You have Great Products and Plentyful of Customers !

...but then Customers begin to Ask More and to Complain

...it was late, it wasn’t that good, it wasn’t as expected...
...does he really expect us to pay !?!

and Competitors start turning around Hungry, Ready, Cheap and Fast

So You Make Efforts to Increase Customers’ Satisfaction…

...and eventually End up somewhat Tired

It’s then High Time to Review Your Planning System !

• Reduce Batch Size
• Launch at the Right Time
• Make it Linear
• Reduce Setup times
• Improve Reliability
• Enlarge Bottlenecks

Look at Your plant from the Product’s point of view: usually it is waiting in a queue

Not convinced? Think a minute at the impact of Batch size...

...there is Always a Queue to Board a (Batch) Ferry Boat

Invest then to reduce Setup Times

Investing in shorter Setup times will always be cheaper than investing in additional capacity

Understand and segment Your Product mix from a Manufacturing point of view

Data are captured from Database, Statistically adjusted, and validated on the Shop-floor

Trace and Simplify the Layout

• HISTORICAL LAYOUT
• 10km / product, a lot of crossings
• Optimized for the Equipment
• Confusion and Diluted Responsibilities

• COMPACT LAYOUT
• Little transfers, no crossings
• Optimized for the Products
• Clarity and Dedicated Teams

• Reduce footprint, transfer costs and WIP by 30%
• Eliminate Crossings: to offset 4 minutes waiting at a traffic light, You need to drive 10% faster over 100 km of motorway

Choose the Bottleneck, don’t let the Bottleneck choose You

• Optimize plant output and return on assets, with the right bottleneck
• Don’t invest in a larger Highway... simply enlarge the toll station
• Stop fighting for high OEE (Overall Equipment Efficiency) on secondary roads

Finally connect the dots and launch at the Right Moment

• Avoid motorways on the first day of vacations
• Set clear priority rules and stick to them
• Fight Randomness everywhere

Stop Bad Quality before it is too late

Prevent Rework from becoming a standard: its hidden cost are enormous, their value small

Improve Reliability: Preventing is Better than Curing (worth investing)

Emergency teams are always busy: plan your operations

Keep Communication Simple on the Shop-floor to Align People and Progress Faster

The four principles of Patrick Antier

Efficiency, Planning and Data

• Most of the data required to analyze the flows and to set priorities for action are probably in your manufacturing database
• Improving the flows brings enormous returns as it requires very little investment, and often prevent spending in unnecessary capacity
• Effective planning is a job for highly competent people, requiring statistical understanding and specific knowledge
• Choose the bottleneck, don’t let the bottleneck choose you: all other equipment need to show some redundancy
• Key challenge is to condensate large quantities of data in simple, readable, operational and statistically significant KPIs, product families, flow maps
• Randomness - rework, bad quality, micro-aleas, breakdowns - are the enemies of efficiency
• Setup times and preventive maintenance are a spending decision, driven by the returns of better service rates

Levanto Partners Modular Road Map to Manufacturing Excellence