7ENT1128 Lean Manufacturing and Services - University of Hertfordshire

Learning Outcome 1: Comprehensively understand LM techniques and TPS and their applications to various contexts including service sectors.

Learning Outcome 2: Compare and contrast models and techniques.

Learning Outcome 3: Justify & evaluate manufacturing processes applying Lean Manufacturing Techniques & TOC

Assignment Brief

Prepare a technical report on lean production principles, practices, and strategies in the Company X supply chain.

Assignment Brief

This case study is about a Bicycle manufacturing company named Company X. Company x was owned by a very traditional family that applied only classical business methods. The main products are standard single and multi-speed bicycles, welded and assembled in Charlotte, NC, with components coming from Company X component manufacturing plants in Detroit, MI, Juarez, Mexico and Shanghai, China, and other suppliers located in Taiwan and Japan. Company X produces about 220,000 bikes per year and has annual sales of $44 Million to various customers, including Walmart, Sears, K-Mart. They supply bikes from three regional warehouses in Charlotte, NC, El Paso, TX, and Detroit, MI. Table 1 shows Company X suppliers, and Table 2 provides the current throughput, lead time, inventory, and transportation cost information for different Company X facilities.

Table 1. Company X Suppliers

Table 2. Throughput, lead time, inventory, and transportation cost for Company X. Location codes using a letter of the company name (X: Company X), location (M: Mexico, D: Detroit, C: China) and product (M: Metal, P: Plastic), e.g., X-M-M: Company X - Mexico - Metal.

Company X has been suffering from long product development cycle times over the past years. As the market competition increases, major rivals of Company X are coming up with innovative bicycles in half the time using the latest technology. There have been occasions that Company X missed the critical product launch dates to capitalize on holiday season sales, and those products that were on time came short of expected sales resulting in losses. Also, Company X main product is a very standard 10-speed bicycle, welded and assembled in Charlotte, NC, with components from the US, China, and Mexico. This product has not been improved in many years to reduce costs.

As one of the senior managers, you have visited the Company X manufacturing operations in Charlotte to start the production planning for a new product and found a very traditional departmental system with large work-in-process (WIP) queues and long lead times as shown in Figure 1. This plant's primary function is to produce frames and forks, then assembled with outsourced components, creating a complete boxed bicycle. There are no formal instructions or communication systems for managing their operations. All personnel work at their own rate, and quality is not measured. Your responsibility is to transform Company X operation using Lean concepts, models, and techniques to improve Company X's supply chain.

For this assignment, you are to:

Question 1. Develop a process for redesigning Company X assembly line and production warehouse layout to minimize waste using process mapping tools.

Question 2. Identify and discuss the critical factors that influence the redesigning process.

Question 3. Analyze how you would implement lean tools and techniques to optimize Company X supply chain processes.

Question 4. Critically analyze the challenges faced when implementing lean tools and techniques. How do Company X characteristics influence these challenges?

Your technical report must contain no more than 900±10% words, including any diagrams, calculations, figures, and tables where appropriate. Use Font Arial 11, normal margins and 1.5 spacing. The word count does not include the title page, table of contents, list of references (in- text citations are included) and appendices. Include a content page.

You are expected to provide a range of secondary sources to underpin your work. These should be cited and referenced according to the Harvard referencing system. Articles to include in your review must be peer-reviewed papers published in the conference proceedings, Books, or journals.