Search results

This paper deals with the organizing of interactive product development. Developing products in interaction between firms may provide benefits in terms of specialization, increased innovation, and possibilities to perform development activities in parallel. However, the differentiation of product development among a number of firms also implies that various dependencies need to be dealt with across firm boundaries. How dependencies may be dealt with across firms is related to how product development is organized. The purpose of the paper is to explore dependencies and how interactive product development may be organized with regard to these dependencies.

The analytical framework is based on the industrial network approach, and deals with the development of products in terms of adaptation and combination of heterogeneous resources. There are dependencies between resources, that is, they are embedded, implying that no resource can be developed in isolation. The characteristics of and dependencies related to four main categories of resources (products, production facilities, business units and business relationships) provide a basis for analyzing the organizing of interactive product development.

Three in-depth case studies are used to explore the organizing of interactive product development with regard to dependencies. The first two cases are based on the development of the electrical system and the seats for Volvo’s large car platform (P2), performed in interaction with Delphi and Lear respectively. The third case is based on the interaction between Scania and Dayco/DFC Tech for the development of various pipes and hoses for a new truck model.

The analysis is focused on what different dependencies the firms considered and dealt with, and how product development was organized with regard to these dependencies. It is concluded that there is a complex and dynamic pattern of dependencies that reaches far beyond the developed product as well as beyond individual business units. To deal with these dependencies, development may be organized in teams where several business units are represented. This enables interaction between different business units’ resource collections, which is important for resource adaptation as well as for innovation. The delimiting and relating functions of the team boundary are elaborated upon and it is argued that also teams may be regarded as actors. It is also concluded that a modular product structure may entail a modular organization with regard to the teams, though, interaction between business units and teams is needed. A strong connection between the technical structure and the organizational structure is identified and it is concluded that policies regarding the technical structure (e.g. concerning “carry-over”) cannot be separated from the management of the organizational structure (e.g. the supplier structure). The organizing of product development is in itself a complex and dynamic task that needs to be subject to interaction between business units.

This paper reports on the history of the main Volvo Tuve truck plant in Gothenburg from its beginnings in 1981 until 2002. It focuses on the assembly work involved in the completion of truck chassis carried out by blue‐collar employees. Extensive (physical) alterations during this period have been important for understanding the plants' present design. The various designs of the assembly system, in combination with alterations and changes, have radically reformed the blue‐collar employee's work in a way that, in most respects, had not been intended. The ambitious guidelines, design assumptions and praxis of the early plant design which promoted collective dimensions of work have shifted to ones in which assembly work can be seen more as a set of individualised tasks. Moreover, the plant, which in earlier times had been small‐scale and utilised a heterogeneous assembly systems design, now has been transformed into a large‐scale plant with a homogenous assembly systems design. That is, to be more specific, two rather short assembly lines with intermediate buffers (1980s assembly systems design) were turned into the use of extended assembly lines without intermediate buffers (1990s assembly systems designs). The latter assembly systems were earlier working in coexistence with so‐called assembly docks (small work groups completed their own truck chassis). Lastly, these heterogeneous assembly systems designs were recently changed by further extension of the two main product flows and the assembly docks were closed down (2000s assembly system design). We argue that the choice of assembly systems designs was, and maybe still is, an ad hoc process and not a truly rational process. The history of the Volvo Tuve plant history illuminates how one specific plant can illustrate an uneven line of development with regard to assembly system design, within an organisation which successively has turned more international by an ongoing process of creating one single, larger scale, assembly system design. Thereby leaving behind the characteristics which were once a trademark of the Swedish automotive industry.

This paper focuses on assembly line performance of an automotive body shop that builds body‐in‐white (BIW) assembly utilizing about 700+ process robots. These robots perform various operations such as welding, sealing, part handling, stud welding and inspection. There is no accurate tool available for the plant personnel to predict the future throughput based on plant's data. The purpose of this paper is to provide future throughput performance prediction based on plant data using Box‐Jenkins' ARMA model.

The following data were collected for five major assembly lines. First, the assembly machine‐in‐cycle time: the assembly line machines include robots that perform various functions like load, welding or sealing and unloading parts; the manual operators loading cycle time to the production fixtures. The conveyors act as buffers in between stations, and also feed to the production cells, and carry parts from station to station. The conveyors' downtime and uptime were also part of the machine‐in‐cycle time; second, the number of units produced from the beginning to the end of the assembly line; third, the number of fault occurrences in the assembly line due to various machine breakdowns; fourth, the machine availability percentage – i.e. the machine is readily available to perform its functions (the machine blocked upstream (starving) and blocked down (downstream) state is considered here); fifth, the actual efficiency of the machine measured in percentage based on output percentage; sixth, the expected number of units at designed efficiency.

In summary, this research paper provided a systematic development of a forecast model based on Box‐Jenkin's ARMA methodology to analyze the complex assembly line process performance data. The developed ARMA forecast models proved that the future prediction can be accurately predicted based on the past plant performance data. The developed ARMA forecast models predicted the future throughput performance within 99.52 percent accuracy. The research findings were validated by the actual plant performance data.

In this study, the automotive assembly process machines (robots, conveyors and fixtures) production data were collected, statistically analyzed and verified for viable ARMA model verification. The verified ARMA model has been used to predict the plant future months' throughput with 99.52 percent accuracy, based on the plant production data. This research is unique because of its practical usage to improve production.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how integral and modular product architectures influence the design properties of the global operations network.

The authors perform a multiple-case study of three global manufacturing companies, using interviews, seminars and structured questionnaires to identify ideal design properties.

The authors find that the choice of integral vs modular product architecture lead to significant differences in the preferred design properties of global operations networks concerning number of key technologies in-house, number of capable plants, focus at assembly plants, distance between assembly plant and market, and number of key supplier sites. Two of these were identified through this research, i.e. the number of capable plants and number of key supplier sites. The authors make a distinction between component and assembly plants, which adds detail to the understanding of the impact of product architecture on global operations. In addition, they develop five propositions that can be tested in further survey research.

This study is restricted to three large manufacturing companies with global operations. However, the authors investigated both integral and modular products at these three companies and their associated global operations network. Still, further case or survey research involving a broader set of companies is warranted.

The key aspects for integral products are to have many key technologies in-house, concentration of production at a few capable plants, and economies-of-scale at assembly plants, while long distances between assembly plants and markets as well as few key supplier sites are acceptable. For modular products, the key aspects are many capable plants, economies-of-scope at assembly plants, short distance between assembly plants and markets, and many key supplier sites, while key technologies do not necessarily have to reside in-house – these can be accessed via key suppliers.

This paper is, to the authors’ knowledge, the first study on the explicit impact of product architecture on global operations networks, especially considering the internal manufacturing network.

With the increasing technological innovation in the automotive industry, the need for complementary innovations in worker organization has arisen. In response to this need, two distinct approaches for teamwork in automotive production have been developed. This paper discusses both the Japanese and the Scandinavian teamwork models and their various implementations found among auto manufacturers worldwide. Work teams must be supported by changes in production philosophy, intensive training programs, and enhanced labor‐management relations. These complementary systems require significant investments, making team building a risky but potentially valuable venture. New insights on team building and its implications for production processes are provided.

This paper explores the conditions under which motor component manufacturers may choose to supply car assembly plants through decentralised production in local assembly units (LAUs). The analysis is based on a case study of the decision to supply motor exhausts through an LAU where demand from the OEM company is sequenced. The case suggests that local assembly may result in significant efficiency gains. However, most of these gains flow to the OEM company, while most of the costs of local assembly flow to the component supplier. This finding emphasises the importance of trust and collaboration within supplier relationships, but suggests that significant possibilities for opportunistic recontracting may exist after the establishment of the LAU. Both supplier and OEM company should consider these possibilities when making the initial investment decision.

Aims to present an alternative way of interpreting unfolding events as these pertain to the organisation of manufacturing practices in the assembly plants of the leading Japanese car assembler, Toyota.

This is an analysis of assembly plant automation in the automotive industry.

Fifteen years ago, it was argued that the lean car assembly plants of the future would be comprehensively automated, but that in the meantime organization rather than automation was the watch‐word for efficient plants. Today it is possible to invert this prognosis as it applies to the leading “lean” car assembler, Toyota. Automation certainly played a much larger role in accounting for high labour productivity in the late 1980s than has generally been understood; but in the subsequent years priority has been given to managing the manual component in car assembly, and aggressive automation as a preferred strategy has been put on ice.

The findings raise new questions about future trends in the world automotive industry.

Multi-manned assembly lines are designed to produce large-sized products, such as automobiles. In this paper, a multi-manned assembly line balancing problem (MALBP) is addressed in which a group of workers simultaneously performs different tasks on a workstation. The key idea in this work is to improve the workstation efficiency and worker efficiency of an automobile plant by minimizing the number of workstations, the number of workers, and the cycle time of the MALBP.

A mixed-integer programming formulation for the problem is proposed. The proposed model is solved with benchmark test problems mentioned in research papers. The automobile case study problem is solved in three steps. In the first step, the authors find the task time of all major tasks. The problem is solved in the second step with the objective of minimizing the cycle time for the sub-tasks and major tasks, respectively. In the third step, the output results obtained from the second step are used to minimize the number of workstations using Lingo 16 solver.

The experimental results of the automobile case study show that there is a large improvement in workstation efficiency and worker efficiency of the plant in terms of reduction in the number of workstations and workers; the number of workstations reduced by 24% with a cycle time of 240 s. The reduced number of workstations led to a reduction in the number of workers (32% reduction) working on that assembly line.

For assembly line practitioners, the results of the study can be beneficial where the manufacturer is required to increased workstation efficiency and worker efficiency and reduce resource requirement and save space for assembling the products.

This paper is the first to apply a multi-manned assembly line balancing approach in real life problem by considering the case study of an automobile plant.

In recent years, assembly lines have been reintroduced in the Swedish automotive industry and, in many cases, have replaced those so‐called alternative assembly systems which had their roots in the 1970s. This paper reviews and evaluates some explicit reasons given for the return to the assembly line. It also considers whether the decisions to replace alternative assembly systems with assembly lines may have been driven by other factors and mechanisms than those implicit in these arguments and, if so, what other factors could explain their reintroduction. There is also a discussion of which dimensions that should be taken into account when choosing between alternative assembly systems and assembly lines and empirical data are used to shed more light on the issues discussed in the article. The authors report one study that compares automobile assembly in an alternative assembly system with assembly of the same products after introducing an assembly line. They also briefly discuss reasons for and experiences from the recent introduction of alternative assembly systems in the Japanese electronics industry. In this case, so‐called cellular assembly systems have replaced assembly lines.