Background
A prominent player in the biotechnology manufacturing industry, operates globally with a substantial revenue of billions of dollars and a workforce of thousands of global employees. The company’s largest manufacturing site is critical, focusing on the production of life-saving products. Despite its global reach and importance, the site faced significant operational challenges impacting its efficiency and product delivery timelines.
Challenges
Lead Time Delays: A major product’s lead time exceeded expectations by 2-3 days on average.
➢ Delivery Interruptions: Late deliveries impacted life-saving product availability, causing customer dissatisfaction.
➢ Schedule Adherence Issues: Interruption in one product’s schedule affected other products’ adherence by 25% – 45% due to shared equipment.
➢ Frequent Schedule Changes: Production teams experienced frequent schedule changes and overtime.
➢ Capacity Loss: An overall capacity loss of 10-25% per year.
Implementation
➢ Bottleneck and Value Stream Mapping: Performed detailed Production Bottleneck and Value Stream Map (Kinetics) Analyses.
➢ Time Studies: Completed intensive Time Studies to identify inefficiencies.
➢ Heat Maps Generation: Created Schedule Adherence and Capacity Utilization Heat Maps.
➢ Sub-Projects for Bottleneck Minimization: Launched 4-5 sub-projects aimed at minimizing bottlenecks.
➢ Continuous Flow Integration: Integrated Continuous Flow Concepts into the Production Schedule to reduce inter-departmental waiting times.
➢ Optimization Model: Developed a new model for asset and capacity utilization, including contingencies.
Results
The implementation led to significant improvements:
➢ Lead Time Reduction: 28% decrease in lead time.
➢ On-Time Completion: 97% product on-time completion rate.
➢ Cost Savings: Achieved $3.2 million in cost savings.
Testimonials
“ The project was comprehensive but the learnings and results are excellent. Production optimization and site engagement to solve bottlenecks taught us how to impact other problematic areas. ” – Site Director
“ We haven’t seen the details of all process-related mingled issues until detailed analyses and time studies were revealed. ” – Senior Director of Quality
