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Quick Response Manufacturing
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Abstract
Whatever the reasons for pursuing a lead-time reduction strategy, time compression across all
company processes is critical to growth, and in some cases, it means survival for today?s
manufacturers.
Table of Contents
- Table of Contents
- Historical Significance of Quick Response Manufacturing
- CASE STUDY 1
- QRM and A-S-A
- Complementary Nature of ERP and QRM
- Quick Response Manufacturing - Major ERP Capabilities and Impacts
- Product Development
- Sales and Service
- CASE STUDY 2
- Manufacturing
- CASE STUDY 3
- eCommerce and QRM
- Office Operations
- Measurement and Tracking
- Faster Flow of Product, Process and Information
Historical Significance of Quick Response Manufacturing
Over the past century, manufacturing strategies have evolved from high volume/low cost to
quality improvement. Now, as an additional minimum requirement, manufacturers must
address quick response. Whatever the reasons for pursuing a lead-time reduction strategy-
customer demands, competitive disadvantages that result in lost market share, high costs or
low quality-time compression across all company processes is critical to growth. In some
cases, it means survival for today?s manufacturers.
The challenges of manufacturing a product have changed and evolved through a series of
stages including an emphasis on economies of scale, time-and-motion efficiency, cost
reduction, and quality improvement in the form of zero defects. These are all important as
minimum requirements for doing business, but the latest dimension, and the one that holds
the key to long-term, wide-ranging success encompassing the entire value chain, is speed. It
not only offers this promise but does so while achieving all the other objectives combined.
Originating in the late 1980?s, quick response techniques are needed more than ever to
compete in today?s global economy. Over the years, these techniques have been
interchangeably referred to as time-based competition, time compression, fast-response, fast-
cycle, lead-time reduction, faster new product introduction (NPI), time-to-market, and most
recently, quick response manufacturing (QRM). (For the purposes of this report, these terms
will be used synonymously.) Despite the differences in names, these techniques all share a
common goal. They are designed for the relentless reduction of long lead-times that result
from non-value-added (NVA) activities. In a manufacturing organization, these NVA activities
can account for as much as 95-99.5 percent of all time on a given process. With great strides
in QRM, companies have achieved lead-time reductions of 50 percent or more in
manufacturing, product development, sales, and office operations.
CASE STUDY 1
Take the example of a manufacturer of 9-1-1 communications systems. For this company,
customer responsiveness is critical because of the heavy reliance on these systems to provide
for the public safety. Using their ERP system as the information backbone, they are able to
provide technical support and, when needed, determine part availability and ship parts the
same day.
Their customers have Internet access to their datamart of parts and descriptions. They can
enter the system, and access repair logs and service call statuses-putting information in the
hands of those who need it, when they need it-facilitating one segment of the QRM chain.
Supporting this type of result are the results of the 4th Annual IndustryWeek Census of
Manufacturers that indicate that plants who have implemented ERP have higher finished
product first-pass yield (scrap and rework affect lead-times), lower manufacturing cycle time,
lower customer lead-time, higher on-time delivery, and as a result of all this, lower costs. How
ERP and QRM are so naturally aligned and accomplish these types of results is the subject of
this paper.
QRM and A-S-A
Lead-time reduction strategies and QRM have been defined in many ways. Most QRM
definitions narrowly address one area of the company, such as new product development
(NPD) or, more often, manufacturing. When applied to the entire organization, QRM can be
defined as follows:
Quick response manufacturing alters the basic structure of the
organization?s work in critical processes to minimize the
unproductive consumption of time. Quick response manufacturing
espouses a relentless emphasis on lead-time reduction. It responds
to customers? needs by rapidly designing and manufacturing
products customized to those needs, and reducing lead-times in
every aspect of a company by eliminating NVA waste (Stalk and
Hout, 1990 and Suri, 1998). The goal of QRM is to get the right
product to the right place at the right time at the right price.
The common elements found in most lead-time reduction efforts include:
- Product-oriented work cells with cross-trained workers who control activity at the cell level
- Smaller lot sizes of both product and information
- Lead-time reduction as the most important, single measurement
- Analysis of processes to identify NVA activities
- Rethinking and reduction of elimination of NVA activities
- Time compression across all departments, not just manufacturing
- High-level bill-of-materials (BOMs)
- Decreased manufacturing variability
- Combination of pull- and push-based production techniques
- Company-wide understanding and commitment
QRM techniques that incorporate the above elements have resulted in extraordinary
improvements (50-100% or better), including:
- Reducing overall lead-times
- Bringing new products to market faster
- Increasing competitive advantage
- Reducing scrap and rework
- Lowering costs
- Recognizing premium pricing
- Improving quality
- Increasing customer satisfaction and loyalty
Further, the ¼-2-20 rule states that for every quartering in time to provide a product,
productivity can double. Companies that cut their consumption of time can also reasonably
expect to enjoy growth rates of three times the industry average with two times the industry
profit margins. These results offer a reason for the sustained momentum behind the QRM
movement and show why it?s necessary to understand how Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)
fits into a QRM environment.
A very simple technique for achieving such dramatic results is the A-S-A technique - Analyze,
Simplify and then Automate. Understanding and documenting current processes and
measurements is required for the success of a QRM project, both because it will provide
information about what to change and a benchmark of the existing conditions. Simplification
takes the form of reducing or eliminating non-value-added processes. For example, generating
an invoice for a shipped order does not add value to the product. In the final step, generating
this invoice can be automated upon the condition of updating the system order status and
automatically generating the invoice (and sending via EDI, fax, etc. if possible). Thus the ERP
system becomes the tool for giving life to a QRM strategy.
Complementary Nature of ERP and QRM
ERP has established a strong heritage of support for lead-time reduction techniques. Its strong
manufacturing engineering base has the required fundamentals for supporting and measuring
the accelerated movement of materials, orders, resources, and information. Enhancements
continue to provide and improve the fast-cycle capabilities to improve rapid launch of new
sales orders, assist in advanced scheduling and integrate trading partners.
ERP plays an important, albeit supporting role in the deployment of a lead-time reduction
strategy. ERP is neither the strategy for lead-time reduction, nor the solution to be deployed.
Rather, ERP must be aligned with quick response techniques in order to facilitate the quick
movement of jobs, projects, processes and information across the enterprise. ERP is in a
unique position to accomplish this because of the pervasiveness of ERP implementations across
the manufacturing industry and its far-reaching ability to extend and integrate manufacturing
functions.
ERP supports a wide-range of QRM techniques. It accelerates information moving through a
company?s operations. It provides instant access to information whenever it?s needed, as soon
as it?s needed, to whoever needs it. It identifies NVA time that can be reduced or eliminated.
ERP eliminates untimely or irrelevant information. Similarly, lead-time reduction methods
always require smaller batches of product that can be produced in shorter periods of time.
Most importantly, ERP provides the infrastructure to improve responsiveness and reduce lead
times across the entire value chain, from product development, to collaboration with suppliers,
to anticipating and identifying customer requirements, to manufacturing, sales, service and the
incremental development of new functionality throughout a product?s lifecycle.
In the following table are a list of major ERP capabilities that are related to a QRM strategy
along with their associated impacts and reasons for using them. This is not a comprehensive
listing, nor should it be viewed as a list of the latest buzz-word compliant terms. These are
capabilities that exist and can be implemented today. Some will be discussed in this document.
Others will not, but they are no less important.
The remainder of this paper focuses on the reduction of lead-time in its various forms across
the manufacturing organization using the capabilities in the table above. Each ERP capability is
discussed in relation to its ability to accomplish this objective. Rather than being redundant,
this focus on lead-time reduction serves to emphasize ERP?s strength in providing many of the
tools necessary to support a QRM strategy. Because of the value chain scope of QRM, this
paper covers the entire manufacturing enterprise by reviewing ERP support for QRM in
product development, sales, manufacturing, and office operations. A final section is devoted
to the measurement aspects of lead-time reduction.
Quick Response Manufacturing - Major ERP Capabilities and Impacts
WhitePaper Page 7
Product Development
Manufacturing?s ability to meet quality, cost and lead-time targets starts with, and is
dependent on, how well engineers execute design engineering. High quality and design for
manufacturability eliminate mistakes in purchasing, rework in manufacturing, engineering
redesign and unnecessary costs, as well as improving a company?s ability to market and sell its
product. Given that 80 percent or more of the engineering process is NVA time, it?s critical to
have capabilities that eliminate as much waste as possible.
In the early stages of new product development, engineering should involve the other
departments participating in the launch of the new product or engineering revision. To aid in
the overlapping of activities and the transfer of small batches of design information to
manufacturing and sales before design completion, engineering or prototype bills allows
engineers to do "what-if" scenarios. These scenarios help the company test purchasing?s
ability to source component parts and manufacturing?s ability to build the specified product.
They also allow lead-time and costs to be determined. The results of early involvement can
save as much as 50 percent in time to new product introduction.
When creating a new product structure, copying bills and routings improve the accuracy and
accelerate the process of introducing a new or enhanced product to manufacturing. Rather
than recreating the entire product structure and routing, the bills and routings function uses
existing, similarly engineered products to reduce the time to generate custom quotes, costing
and lead times. With strict engineering change order (ECO) control, other departments (e.g.,
production planning, purchasing, inventory, sales, manufacturing engineering, and vendors)
can begin preparing materials, routings, sales orders and so on, to introduce changes into the
manufacturing environment. Lead-times are reduced by eliminating waste in coordinating the
purchasing and use-up effectivity control of obsolete materials and avoidance of orders based
on wrong revision levels.
Manufacturers with design teams that are effective in these areas are able to:
- Capture market share by getting products to market earlier
- Recognize price premiums by being first to introduce new technologies
- Reduce obsolescence of designs
- Decrease rework and manufacturing costs
- Increase engineering new product introduction (NPI) capacity
Sales and Service
The customer interface is an often-overlooked activity. Sales is concerned with four factors:
cost, features, quality, and availability. Since back-office processing time frequently accounts
for more than 60 percent of the total lead-time (Stalk and Hout, Competing Against Time,
1990), there is a great opportunity to eliminate or automate the flow of information. Move
and queue time of order information traveling from one department or person to another can
also be improved.
As customers' needs change, they may want more or different products. With Sales Force
Automation (SFA) your sales force can provide accurate and up-to-date quotes, while meeting
with clients or prospects, on the precise product in the configuration they want. Reps may
look at pricing options, order history, promise dates and standard and custom configurations.
All this is available "on-the-fly" using the sales reps' laptop. Quoting, order configuring, order
status and available-to-promise can all be rendered remotely. In this era of quick response
manufacturing, SFA can quickly boost customer satisfaction and secure a competitive
advantage.
With SFA:
- Sales laptops become portable offices
- Same capabilities apply that are available in sales order processing, sales quote processing and configure-to-order
- Sales orders and quotes are entered from remote laptops
- Database updates are bi-directional for on-the-spot pricing, availability and other information
- Access is available to customer-based catalog pricing
- Customer contact records are accessible
- Fast verification of unique product configurations and pricing are allowed
- Fast and accurate quotes can be generated
- Order status can be checked remotely
- Current available-to-promise dates can be provided
- Quick response to needs is met through advanced customer analytics
To narrow the gap between a manufacturer and its customer, new Vendor Managed Inventory
(VMI) capabilities reduce time from customer need for replenishment to order and delivery.
VMI helps compress the time to wait for customer orders, and reduces customer and supplier
buffer inventories (i.e., response time work-arounds) as well as order changes. Customer
inventory transactions (e.g., issues) are fed online to the manufacturer who, based on a
blanket PO, can automatically identify when an item drops below the minimum on-hand
quantity and launch a sales or work order.
The CTO system accelerates the transfer of knowledge from engineering to sales and
manufacturing by predefining models, options, conditional rules, bills, routings, and pricing.
This coordinated transfer of knowledge eliminates the fumbles and delays associated with
engineering each and every order. CTO promotes standardization, increases product variety
and decreases production variability by reducing the number of custom engineered orders.
This decreases lead-times by getting orders into manufacturing faster with predefined bills,
routings and fewer setups. Mobile CTO brings the manufacturer and customer even closer,
and closer means faster.
CASE STUDY 2
In the case of a manufacturer of technology-driven equipment for the gaming industry (i.e.,
slot machines), they use CTO to reduce processes that took days and weeks to seconds. Each
product is so different it?s almost like an engineer-to-order environment. Customers choose
denominations, payout tables, glass, lights, plating and other options and features.
Traditionally it would take days and weeks for engineers to create a custom design for each
order. With the configurator they enter the order, create the bill and routing, roll up the costs
and calculate the price - all in a matter of seconds. The effect was to slash lead-times across
their enterprise.
During the sales cycle, available-to-promise calculations that use a critical path lead-time
calculation ensure more reliable delivery dates and identify processes with long lead-times. A
quick response manufacturing feature minimizes the number of transactions required to fulfill
orders by allowing purchasing to receive materials directly to the shop floor for consumption.
Then, when the sales order is booked, work orders can be issued directly to manufacturing
and automatically relieve inventories when the order is shipped. By producing product at the
same rate and mix as incoming orders the QRM application has reduced order steps by 86
percent and delivery time by 80 percent.
Sales consignments, where "we own it, but the customer has possession of it," helps integrate
customers into the QRM process by putting inventory at the closest point-of-use (POU).
Integrated with sales order entry, invoicing and A/R, stock is removed from on-hand balances
(with no impact on manufacturing and planning) while maintaining tracking, control, shipping
and invoicing. To further integrate the customer into the QRM process, advance ship notices
from suppliers to customers reduce the delays in customers being able to start jobs or
operations. Truck scheduling coordinates loading and delivery of customer shipments with
production, generates the shop floor dispatch list in truckload sequence, and allows delivery
routes to be set up for maximum efficiency. Time is minimized between order completion and
truck loading - improving the real lead-time.
Closing the loop after the sale, service call management documents calls for product service,
and prioritizes and notifies appropriate personnel of actions to be taken. The service call
management capability reduces the time for problem resolution and eliminates the possibility
of open cases falling through the cracks. Both service call management and quality systems
document and close the loop with engineering by identifying warranty, service and production
problems. Problem codes, reason codes and cause codes help manufacturers more efficiently
fix product defects that often cause increased manufacturing lead-times resulting from scrap
and rework. These codes also can help reduce costs and connect time-based strategies to the
needs of customers.
Manufacturing
Manufacturing is the natural place to look for lead-time reduction. Manufacturing has been
studied more than any other area of a manufacturer?s business. Producing more products, in
greater variety, with lower cost, in less time requires manufacturers to rethink the fundamental
processes involved.
Repetitive manufacturing and demand flow techniques require a fundamental change in the
manufacturing process. It takes into account, and goes beyond, principles that have been used
in many time-compression projects, such as small lot sizes, product-oriented layout with local
control, JIT and Kanban. It simplifies operations and reduces paperwork by eliminating work
orders, reducing items and levels in BOM's, and incorporating high-level MRP planning on a
daily flow basis at a component level rather than at a work order level. Blanket purchase
orders, vendor schedules and delivery synchronization ensure the availability of materials to
support the flow rate. Materials are received and delivered directly to point-of-use, such as an
assembly line where usage and costs can be captured. Material movement can be pre-
specified at designated points to reduce time waiting for parts. To complete the cycle,
backflushing of component inventory is performed based on completed production. The
repetitive manufacturing process reduces the number of steps required to manufacture
product. It minimizes the number of times an order is touched and open to error, while
offering a simpler and faster flow of materials and information.
CASE STUDY 3
A manufacturer of fastening equipment for the construction industry (i.e., nail guns) was able
to automate their manufacturing process from receipt of materials through shipment. Using
repetitive manufacturing to establish what they termed a market rate of demand for
production, they order and receive raw materials directly to the point-of-use in the plant.
When issued to the job, the accounts payable system is automatically triggered to pay the
invoice for the materials. The product is built and when shipped, the accounts receivable
system is automatically triggered to generate an invoice. Results include cutting sales order
steps from 84 to 12 and reducing customer lead-time from 5 days to 1 day.
Repetitive order groups (ROGs) manages groups of production orders by coordinating the
processing of multiple orders in a continuous operation. ROGs reduce manufacturing lead-
time by scheduling parallel or combined operations in order to minimize queue time for
downstream cells needing the output of this operation. Additionally, products can be sorted
and produced sequentially according to size, color, shape, metal type, etc., to help reduce
setup time, changeover time and lead-time by up to 20 percent. Further setup reductions can
be achieved by running "like set-ups" together, sequentially or with overlap through work
order groups (WOGs). By including tooling in the list of resources, tools are scheduled and
delivered when needed.
An alternative technique known as master production rate-based scheduling (MPRS) levels
production rates and eliminates the effect of demand variability. It smoothes out the ups and
downs of production, eliminating backlogs and reducing lead-times by establishing a planned
and budgeted utilization rate. Increased throughput can be achieved when product can be
made to a plan rather than reacting to cyclical swings. MPRS eliminates padded lead-times
traditionally established by each department. MPRS can be set at a level (e.g., 80 percent) to
minimize idle time and produce the shortest lead-time while addressing queue time and
variability of job times.
Rounding out the manufacturing capabilities, plant maintenance reduces variability of machine
time and overall lead-time by making sure machines are not going down unexpectedly.
Scheduling can be based on mileage, calendar and cycles, or manually user-defined. It also
supports warranty tracking, parts inventory, purchase order creation, skill levels required for
repairing equipment, work orders, and costs. Without this often overlooked piece of the
puzzle, managing a QRM implementation can be nearly impossible due to machine downtime
variability.
eCommerce and QRM
Electronic commerce also plays a role in the QRM principles for making sure information
moves in a frictionless fashion to whoever needs it, when they need it. eCommerce cannot be
covered in any length in this paper, but with the business-to-business (B2B) transactions
forecasted to reach or exceed $3 trillion, it can hardly be ignored. Nor are manufacturing
executives doing so. Practically all have a corporate Web site and nearly a fourth are involved
in an extranet linking up to customers and/or suppliers. The applicability to QRM is obvious in
its ability to make information instantly available and increase visibility across the supply chain.
The hottest eCommerce technology strategies that the integration of the entire supply chain
are eProcurement, Product Change Collaboration (PCC) and Knowledge Portals. eProcurement
is all about connecting the manufacturers with the right suppliers and is represented in
electronics by companies referred to as trading exchanges. These trading exchanges seek to
reduce the time and cost of procurement by eliminating and combining entire parts of the
process of researching, contacting, bidding, contracting, logistics and payment. PCC and
cCommerce are all about creating collaborative environments between members of complex
supply chains. PCC provides collaboration during product development and throughout the
product lifecycle for managing design and change information and processes to shorten the
introduction of new products and revisions that with a level of form, function and fit because
they are jointly developed with suppliers, manufacturers and customers. cCommerce brings
collaboration to the manufacturing cycle to provide two-way visibility between manufacturers
and their customers and suppliers. Simplistically speaking, suppliers see what?s needed, when
it?s needed and customers see the up-to-date status of their orders. There?s more to it,
obviously, but the idea is that connectivity, visibility and collaboration means less wait time and
queue time for all members of the supply chain and the ability to respond in the shortest
possible time - key principles of QRM.
Knowledge Portals offer a more flexible way to accommodate eBusiness strategies, providing
entry and exit points between systems with a common or translatable data format. For
example, through a portal connecting a supplier and its customer, Vendor Managed Inventory
(VMI) is just one type of eCommerce technology that dramatically shortens the process from
customer need to order entry to production and shipping. Through VMI, a manufacturer has
direct, on-line access to its customers? current inventory. When parts are issued to a work
order from the customer?s inventory, the transaction is sent to the supplier who keeps track of
replenishment levels and can automatically generate new requirements and orders based on
the order in the system for that customer. Any batch size can be accommodated by VMI,
avoiding overstocks and out-of-stocks. And the relationship with the customer is much closer.
Other portals may be by roles (e.g., sales, service, etc.) or by industry - called Vortals -
providing customized industry information.
Office Operations
Because they make up the majority of lead-time, procedures in the backoffice are even more
important to consider than procedures in development, manufacturing and sales. It is not
uncommon for the movement of documentation and queue time at each stage to make up
more than 60 percent of overall lead-time.
Workflow empowers employees by applying conditional rules to processes to determine which
decisions need what level of approval. It reduces intellectual and physical rework and lead-time
by ensuring consistency in processes.
Workflow is based on an event/condition/action (ECA) architecture. It triggers actions, such as
e-mail messages, alarms and faxes, when predefined events occur. These events are often
associated with conditions, such as a new ECO, a credit limit or a purchasing authorization
amount. When an ECA that is carrying its associated data is triggered, a series of activities to
multiple users can be initiated. It is not difficult to see how time can be saved throughout the
entire value delivery system by making information timely and relevant. In cases such as
customer quotes, where engineering revisions, purchasing, production planning, credit and
other departments are involved in the process, workflow automates, combines and ensures
the proper sequence of office operations. Information is moved immediately instead of waiting
for batches of information to be ready to move. "White-collar" NVA time is greatly reduced
along with errors in re-entering data and sending on-line notifications. Costly rework, which is
a major cause of long lead-times, can be virtually eliminated.
The Internet, e-mail and EDI continue to be major trends extending the use of electronic
communications in the office environment. When integrated with sales order processing and
accounts receivable, EDI and electronic funds transfer (EFT) speed the receivable process by
allowing invoices and payments to be electronically transmitted as soon as customer orders
have been shipped. EDI can be applied to the automation of many areas of office procedures,
including quotes, purchase orders, sales orders, order acknowledgements, and advanced
shipping notices. Mundane and repetitive tasks, redundant data, human error, and rework are
minimized. EDI is designed to shorten the time gap between a manufacturer and its customers
and suppliers.
With the proliferation of e-mail, many business transactions are being handled on-line both
inside and outside the company. The combination of an ERP system and the Internet provide
the ability to access the system over the Web regardless of location. For some time, pointers to
Web pages from within ERP applications have provided access to Web pages, such as vendor
product pages. Most recently, Web publishing has made it possible to publish virtually any
report to the Web from within the system. Providing customers and vendors access to instant
and up-to-date information such as invoices, shipping notices, engineering changes, and
purchase orders provide a giant step towards reducing the order-to-cash cycle. As Web-based
technologies evolve and mature, both customers and suppliers will have even more immediate
access to the information on which they need to act quickly and in concert with the
manufacturer?s QRM strategy.
Measurement and Tracking
Measurements for quick response manufacturing vary. The measurements include, but are not
limited to, manufacturing lead-time, new product introduction time, order entry-to-ship time,
and break-even time. Regardless of what is measured, lead-time reduction must be the metric
used.
Manufacturing Lead-Time Management (MLT) supports parallel sequencing of operations in
order to reduce the total manufacturing lead-time and provide a more realistic view of how
work is actually performed in the factory. MLT allows operations to overlap up to 100 percent
so that subsequent operations can start before a previous operation is complete. Materials are
transferred in smaller batches when complete, thereby reducing lead-time by completing all
operations more quickly. Consideration for move time, queue time, outplant services, setup,
pick, inspection, put-away, overlap, runtime, yield, shrink/scrap, and spread is standard. Lead-
times can be based on quantities and be manually established, or "calculated" or linear. Plans
are based on standard or calculated lead-times. After introducing QRM improvements, lead-
time data can be collected via automated data collection and compared to standard lead-time
measures. MLT can then be adjusted to reflect new lead-times and generate more realistic
plans that build confidence in the schedule.
Monitors detect variances from lead-time targets. A monitor is a dynamic window of
information that automatically displays data and refreshes without user intervention. They are
similar in function to flight monitors at airports and are especially useful for information that
needs to be checked periodically or that triggers some action. Monitors can track lead-times
and determine the up-to-date status of outplant operations. They can identify bottlenecks,
real-time orders, on-hold orders that require management decisions (e.g., credit hold), late
customer shipments, delinquent service calls or any other process for which data is
maintained. To further accelerate the pace of taking actions, monitors have drill-down
capabilities to view details of items requiring attention.
Vendor performance rating and the ability to select an approved vendor controls engineering?s
selection of components that can be used by manufacturing. Ratings can include reject rates
and delivery performance (early, on time and late). By comparing purchase order date and
receipt date, vendor lead-time can be quickly determined.
Prerequisite to the ability to quickly assess lead-times is automated data input (ADI) and shop
floor data collection, a real-time method of collecting more timely and accurate information
on work order status. Bar coded shop and inventory paperwork enable shop employees to
scan and record data as they complete work. ADI eliminates unnecessary and slow data entry
by providing better and faster information on what can be made and/or shipped, quicker
identification of quality and rework problems, and faster and more accurate updates to
inventory and schedules. Automated data collection provides up-to-the-minute visibility into
the shop floor. This improved visibility helps jobs move faster with less queue and wait time, by
manually and quickly moving information about upstream operations.
Faster Flow of Product, Process and Information
A quality process yields a quality product. QRM is all about rethinking and improving
processes. This involves eliminating idle or dead time wherever it exists, processing work in
smaller batches and maximizing value-added time. It is said that the success of a lead-time
reduction effort is determined more by how it is implemented rather than by what is
implemented. Although a sample of the major ERP tools supporting QRM implementations has
been discussed, many other capabilities exist that can be used to assist with time compression.
It doesn?t require the most advanced technological solutions. It depends on how they are
deployed. To those who deploy them right, the results translate directly to company
profitability and growth. These results include faster NPI, technology leadership, reduced costs,
and increased market share, customer satisfaction and loyalty. It is important to fix processes
first, then automate, not rushing in too fast without seriously rethinking how the business is
run. Having done that, there?s no doubt that time is a key factor in determining which
companies grow and succeed and, conversely, which ones stumble and fall (Fred Smith, CEO,
Federal Express Corporation, 1988).
About Epicor
For 20 years, Epicor has been a recognized leader dedicated to providing leading edge
enterprise software solutions to midmarket companies around the world. With over 15,000
customers, Epicor delivers end-to-end, industry-specific solutions that enable companies to
immediately improve business operations and build competitive advantage in today?s real-time
global economy. Epicor?s comprehensive suite of integrated software solutions for Customer
Relationship Management, Financials, Manufacturing, Supply Chain Management, and
Services Execution and Control provide the scalability and flexibility to support long-term
growth. Epicor?s solutions are complemented by a full range of services, providing a single
point of accountability to promote rapid return on investment and low total cost of ownership.
Trademark and Copyright Acknowledgement
Copyright© Epicor Software Corporation 2004. Epicor Vista, Epicor Vantage, and Epicor
Manage 2000 are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Epicor Software Corporation.
All other trademarks acknowledged. Epicor reserves the right to make modifications or
changes to the functionality, and plans described herein without further notice. This document
is intended solely to inform the audience of Epicor's current intentions. Epicor makes no
warranties, express or implied in or by this document. The contents of this document are
believed to be current and accurate as of its date of publication. For a complete description of
the product features, please refer to the product?s user guides, reference manuals and release
notes.
For more information, contact Epicor at (800) 449-6772 or by e-mail at vantage.info@epicor.com