Summary
Custom Molds was founded by a father and son team in 1987 to provide high quality, custom-designed molds for manufacturers of electronic connectors, but later expanded into the production of plastic parts for the industry. In recent years, the changing environment of the electronics industry had a profound impact on the way Custom Molds conducts its business and manufacturing processes. The changing sales mix, coupled with delivery and quality problems, prompted the company to revise its business strategies to address the following issues:
1) Changing trends in the electronics manufacturing industry that caused changes in customer order needs
2) Unpredictable bottlenecks in the production environment
3) Quality issues resulting in defective parts
4) Delivery times
1. Major Issues
Question 1 - What are the major issues facing Tom and Mason Miller?
1.1 Changing Trends
There were several issues facing the owners of the company. Firstly, the major issue is the electronics industry was changing in that manufacturers were developing strategic partnerships that allowed the delivery of high quality and cost effective parts. Also, the nature of their business had shifted in that the mix of sales had changed with the number of multiple orders declining and the demand for plastic parts increasing (Krajewski & Ritzman, 2007).
In comparing with mold fabrication and plastic part (see appendix), it is clear that plastic parts has a higher potential sales than mold fabrication on a larger order size. This will allow Tom and Mason to think whether it is best to eliminate mold fabrication and focus on more towards plastic parts because of the changing environment.
1.2 Production Process
There were also ineffi ...