Leanand Mean Getsrnextreme

摘要

When surgical device maker Conmed decided in 2007 to streamline production, executives explored the usual options. The Utica (N.Y.) company could ship more manufacturing to China. Or it could invest in automation.rnConmed chose a third path instead: It completely overhauled its production.rnLong assembly lines at its 600 -worker Utica plant have given way to compact U-shaped workstations. Piles of plastic boxes stuffed with enough parts to last weeks have been replaced by just a few bins containing the exact number of parts needed. No longer do workers furiously crank out products that languish in warehouses. Instead they build only as many as customers need at the time. Conmed calculates that every 90 seconds hospitals worldwide use one of its disposable devices for inserting and removing fluids around joints during ortho -scopic surgery. So that's precisely how long it takes for a new one to roll off its assembly line. A growing number of products,rnsuch as instruments for cutting bone, are assembled only after hospitals place orders. "The goal is to link our operations as closely as possible to the ultimate buyer of the product," says David A. Johnson, vice-president for global operations.