Agile Production

Jan 9, 2012

Agile manufacturing is the ability for processes, tools, and training to be changed promptly in order to adapt to the needs of the market. It also ensures that control cost and quality are taken into account while also creating strategies for made-to-order production.

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Agile pro­duc­tion began as a busi­ness con­cept but has turned into a new form of man­u­fac­tur­ing that may change the pro­duc­tion world in the future. Lean man­u­fac­tur­ing once dom­i­nat­ed pro­duc­tion lines but it now has a new oppo­nent that is chal­leng­ing tra­di­tion­al man­u­fac­tur­ing once char­ac­ter­ized by high order quan­ti­ties, capac­i­ty, and inventory.

Def­i­n­i­tion:

Agile man­u­fac­tur­ing is the process­es, tools, and train­ing need­ed to react swift­ly to cus­tomer needs and changes in the mar­ket while still being able to con­trol cost and qual­i­ty. It involves strat­e­gy for incor­po­rat­ing veloc­i­ty and flex­i­bil­i­ty with a make-to-order or con­fig­ure-to-order pro­duc­tion process. The ide­al for agile in pro­duc­tion is to have mar­gin­al changeover time and inter­rup­tions. It also includes a low vol­ume of prod­ucts with high flex­i­bil­i­ty for customization.

Suc­cess and Benefits: 

Agile man­u­fac­tur­ing is most suc­cess­ful in envi­ron­ments where spe­cial­iza­tion, cus­tomiza­tion, and con­fig­u­ra­tion have a com­pet­i­tive edge. The key to agile pro­duc­tion is cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion. This is achieved through pro­duc­ing prod­ucts with speed and ver­sa­til­i­ty while meet­ing cus­tomer needs.

With pro­duc­tion agile suc­cess comes sev­er­al ben­e­fits which include:

  • Specialization
  • Customization
  • Flexibility
  • Low cost
  • High quality
  • Low inventory
  • Short lead time


For more infor­ma­tion on agile man­u­fac­tur­ing or a quote, please con­tact Robots​.com online or at 8777626881.

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