TWO YEARS AGO, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co.'s factory in Saga, on Japan's southern island of Kyushu, was looking mighty lean. The plant had doubled efficiency over the previous four years, and machinery stretching the length of the spotless facility could churn out cordless phones, fax machines, and security cameras in record time. But Matsushita officials still saw fat that could be trimmed. So the plant's managers, Hitoshi Hirata and Hirofumi Tsuru, ripped out the conveyer belts and replaced them with clusters of robots. New software synchronizes production so each robot is ready to jump into action as soon as the previous step is completed. And if one robot breaks down, the work flow can be shifted to others that do the same job. "It used to be 2 1/2 days into a production run before we had our first finished product. But now the first is done in 40 minutes," Hirata says. "Next year we'll try to shorten the cycle even more."
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