A key component of Pacific Scientific HTL, an internationally
renowned maker of aerospace safety equipment and military
defense hardware, lean journey was to institute a kanban system
that would govern the flow of materials from their suppliers and
through their facility. While visual cues governed their
internal production kanban system, fax releases signaled their
suppliers.
After a year and a half of using the paper fax release system,
it was clear that it simply didn't scale for PS/HTL's 100-plus
suppliers, more than 100 fax numbers over 3500 parts on kanban,
and 2000 signals sent each month. With numerous points of
possible failure--did a fax get sent? Was it received? Was it
legible? Was it acted on?--the system encouraged inefficient
behavior all around.
A 20-minute webcast demonstration of Datacraft Solutions'
e-kanban product had alerted Gintz to a system that aligned
perfectly with what PS/HTL needed: a system that was easy to
learn and use for buyers, planners, and suppliers, and visible
enough that everyone involved could do their jobs without
constant confusion and supply worries cutting into productivity.
Clearly PS/HTL needed a way out of the paper fax morass and into
some kind of controlled, electronic kanban system. As PS/HTL's
Purchasing Manager Cari Gintz says, "What led us to decide to go
electronic kanban, was sheer frustration and the need to start
managing instead of reacting."
Datacraft Solutions and Gintz approached their work together as
a project with measurable goals and a clear, phased
implementation strategy. These were some of the specific goals
PS/HTL targeted:
* Be assured of getting what's ordered, and only what's ordered,
at the expected date * Handle the unpredictable--spikes in
demand and other exceptions--predictably * Get a clear picture
of the health of every cell and kanban at any time *
Automatically calculate expected-on-dock delivery dates based on
replenishment lead times * Rapidly bring suppliers on board and
provide them visibility of the kanbans they support * Shorten
replenishment times based on true schedules rather than
one-size-fits-all guesswork * Evaluate and motivate supplier
performance based on accurate tracking of delivery times and
quantities
Datacraft Solutions www.datacraft solutions.com Matthew Marotta
800-819-5326
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