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Introduction:
In today’s business environment, the battleground is changing from high volume, low variety, make to forecast manufacture to the speed and flexibility necessary to respond to changing consumer tastes and to competitor activity. High quality products and services, lower cost and shorter delivery lead time are the deciding factors to obtain new business or new order. A flexible production system such as Just in time must be in place in order to meet these requirements and stay competitive in the business. Table 1 and Table 2 shown below explain how Just in time can provide different forms of competitive advantage and how Just in time can support the company strategies.
Table 1: Just in time and competitive advantage (Alan Harrison, 1992)
WIP reduction Lower cost manufacture
Reduced order to delivery lead time
Increased flexibility Responsive to customer demands,
volume, short lead time, product change.
Raw material reduction Lower cost manufacture
Increased quality Higher quality products
Lower cost manufacture
Increased productivity Lower cost manufacture
Reduced space requirements Lower cost manufacture
Lower Overheads Lower cost manufacture
Table 2: Company strategies and JIT (Alan Harrison, 1992)
Rapid response to customer needs Flexibility
WIP reduction
Compete on quality Increased quality