Waymouth Manufacturing operates a contract manufacturing plant located in Dublin, Ireland. The plant provides a variety of

Question:

Waymouth Manufacturing operates a contract manufacturing plant located in Dublin, Ireland. The plant provides a variety of electronics products and components to consumer goods manufacturers around the world. Cycle time is a critical success factor for Waymouth, which has developed a number of measures of manufacturing speed. Waymouth has studied the matter and found that competitive contract manufacturers have manufacturing cycle times (MCE) of about 40%. When last calculated, Waymouth's MCE was 35%. Key measures from the recent month's production, averaged over all the jobs during that period, are as follows:

Activity ........................................ Average Time

........................................................ (Hours)

New product development ................................ 30

Materials handling ............................................ 2

Order setup ................................................... 6

Machine maintenance ........................................ 3

Order scheduling ............................................... 1

Inspection of completed order .............................. 5

Pack and move to storage or ship .......................... 2

Manufacturing assembly ................................... 24

Order taking and checking ................................... 3

Receiving and stocking raw materials ....................... 6