Healthcare products manufacturer – Lean manufacturing programme

The client is a part of one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical and healthcare products companies, and manufactures sutures and other wound care products. European operations amount to about US$1 bn. The company wished to improve responsiveness to customers (i.e. fill rate) and at the same time reduce manufacturing costs and inventory. A lean manufacturing programme was embarked upon. This started with diagnostic study to calculate anticipated improvements in the areas of: - labour manufacturing cost -waste -inventory levels - cycle time - lead time Changes were made to the planning processes, the line physical layout, the direct labour organisation and relevant performance measures. All changes were implemented on time and targeted improvements achieved ahead of schedule.