Ökad leveransprecision genom fokuserad tillverkning?

To compete on mature markets, businesses need to create processes able to meet the demands imposed by the market. The most important aspect for manufacturing companies is to have production processes and infrastructure able to support the order winners and qualifiers that exist on a specific market. The processes and infrastructure need to be aligned and meet the same order winners and qualifiers. Trying to meet different demands with one single process causes a high level of complexity and makes it hard to compete. Ballingslöv AB is a well known Swedish manufacturer of kitchen and bathroom furnishing. In 2003, a new increased range of bathroom furnishing was introduced. Combined with an increase in demand this led to an increased level of complexity in the planning and production processes. The manufacturing resources are split between kitchen and bathroom production where bathroom stands for five percent of the total production. Today, the company experiences difficulties to meet the demands on on-time-delivery, the claims are increasing and in the end, they risk losing their customers. The reason for this is believed to be the fact that kitchen and bathroom assembly share the same critical resources. In order to solve the problems mentioned above, the company is considering moving the bathroom assembly to a separate section. The purpose of this thesis is to create a basis for decision for a possible transfer of the bathroom assembly. The thesis states weather a separate bathroom assembly can solve these problems and create a process that better support the market demands. A qualitative case study, based on face-to-face interviews, is the methodology used in fulfilling the purpose of the study. The framework created by Terry Hill for reflecting manufacturing strategy issues in corporate decisions has been used in attacking the problem. The study has reviled that the company’s inability in meeting on-time-delivery is not related to the fact that the kitchen and bathroom assembly share critical resources. The real problem lies in an inadequate infrastructure that neither supports the market demands nor the production process. In addition the company tries to support different market segments, with different demands, thus causing a high level of complexity throughout the production process. The difference in market demands that has the greatest implication on the production process is the fact that bath customers demands a shorter delivery time then does the kitchen customers. To solve the problems in meeting on-time-delivery the company must invest in infrastructure that supports the market demands. With a make-to-stock strategy for bathroom furnishing, the company is able to reduce the complexity and offer a competitive delivery time