Now showing 1 - 5 of 5
  • Publication
    Plant reengineering through core process design
    ( 1995)
    Mertins, K.
    ;
    Edeler, H.
    ;
    Rabe, M.
    ;
    Sauer, O.
  • Publication
    Designing the company specific core process
    ( 1994)
    Mertins, K.
    ;
    Edeler, H.
    ;
    Rabe, M.
    ;
    Sauer, O.
    Since product innovations are imitated immediately, competitive advantage of product innovations does not last very long whereas the process of gaining competence and experience in developing and producing requires great efforts for all competitors. International competition forces European production enterprises to decide about their future manufacturing strategy. This decision turns out to be of vital importance. The strategy for European manufacturers has to be putting focus on producing only a carefully selected spectrum of strategic products and components. The decision whether to keep a component or an assembly that has to be produced in-house is a strategic decision and cannot be dealt with as an operative question. The division Systems Planning at the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology (IPK), Berlin/FRG has developed a method for enterprises of production industry to maintain and even improve their market situation by selecting the company's core assemblies and core components. The elaborated method helps to structure and organize the production process.
  • Publication
    Core process design
    ( 1994)
    Mertins, K.
    ;
    Edeler, H.
    ;
    Sauer, O.
    To live a life beyond lean production European companies have to reorganize their structures using such strategic tools as value management, outsourcing and flexible manufacturing concerning their specific European characteristics. On one hand several methods have been worked out to support the make or buy decision process whether to keep services and the manufacturing of parts and subcomponents in-house or to buy them. Unfortunately cost oriented approaches like those based on transaction theory lack quantification of parameters because of traditional calculation- and controlling systems. Their practical use is yet limited. But during the last years it has become clear, that a proper use of make or buy concerning a corporations mix of strategies can strengthen its competitiveness. On the other hand various techniques help to structure the whole spectrum of parts into sets or part families to support the introduction of group technology or different forms of cellular manufacturing. Yet there still is a lack of methods that include both make or buy decisions derived from the company's stategy as well as the structuring of the production process based on the chosen core assemblies and components. The link between corporate and business strategies as described in the Swiss St. Galler management model (Gomez, 1993) and a set of criteria to identify a company's strategic 'make' components has been discussed in the previous paper. This article deals with a methodology to support the tasks on the modelling-/structuring level and the technological-/organizational level. The two mentioned papers describe a comprehensive approach to link the two issues of strategic make or buy and factory structuring and therefore support all tasks of comprehensive planning.
  • Publication
    Strategic selection of core components
    ( 1994)
    Mertins, K.
    ;
    Edeler, H.
    ;
    Sauer, O.
    Since product innovations are imitated immediately, competitive advantage of product innovations does not last very long whereas the process of gaining competence and experience in development and production requires great efforts for all competitors. International competition forces European production enterprises to decide about their future manufacturing strategy. This decision turns out to be of vital importance. The strategy for European manufacturers has to be putting focus on producing only a carefully selected spectrum of strategic products and components. The decision whether to keep a component or an assembly that has to be produced in-house is a strategic decision and cannot be dealt with as an operative question. The division Systems Planning at the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology (IPK), Berlin/FRG has developed a method for enterprises of production industry to maintain and even improve their market situation and their corporate value by s electing the company's core assemblies and core components.
  • Publication
    The company-specific core-process
    ( 1994)
    Mertins, K.
    ;
    Edeler, H.
    ;
    Sauer, O.
    Since product innovations are imitated immediately, competitive advantage of product innovations does not last very long whereas the process of gaining competence and experience in development and production requires great efforts for all competitors. International competition forces European production enterprises to decide about their future manufacturing strategy. This decision turns out to be of vital importance. The strategy for European manufacturers has to be putting focus on producing only a carefully selected spectrum of strategic products and components. The decision whether to keep a component or an assembly that has to be produced in-house is a strategic decision and cannot be dealt with as an operative question. The division Systems Planning at the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology (IPK), Berlin/FRG has developed a method for enterprises of production industry to maintain and even improve their market situation by selecting the company's cor e assemblies and core components.