AUTOMOTIVE MANUFACTURING

摘要

You think your industry is tough when it comes to late shipments? How about a penalty of $5,000 a minute for being late with a shipment that causes the customer's plant to shut down? How about losing a four-year contract because of only two late shipments in the same year? So why are automotive customers so tough and demanding? Imagine a mixed-model assembly line where there are more than one million potential combinations of finished product. Next, imagine the feeder lines that supply the mixed-model assembly line—what it takes to coordi- nate the precise configuration of parts in the right order. Then, imagine that the feeder lines are in other plants, even in other states, and that the "conveyer belt" that brings the parts to the final assembly line is a truck (actually, many trucks). That's automotive final assembly and its supply chain.