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Lean Manufacturing Simulation Game 

Many companies today use sophisticated market research to target selective segments of their market place for specific promotions.

This technique allows the vendor to tailor its product or service in a way which matches the customer's known buying pattern or lifestyle. Finding out what your cus­tomer wants and building a delivery channel to meet their specific requirements is how companies improve their competitive edge and ultimately improve their profit margins.

There are lessons to be learned from this technique for many companies in the chemical industry. The more that the vendor can tailor its marketing or its product to better match the requirements of the customer, the better the level of service that can be delivered. A higher premium can be charged for better service, or alternatively a higher loyalty can be built to the vendor's product.
Integrating quality information into the production, inven­tory and order processing cycles can assist the vendor to improve both service levels and achieve higher customer loyalty. This should lead directly to higher product mar­gins.

The Quality Dimension

Few products in batch process manufacturing can be made to an identical specification time after time. Even with the best plant available, there are many factors both inside and outside of the process itself which will lead to variation of output quality.

Most processing activities involve natural products (e.g., agricultural, mineral, organic and so on). These can vary considerably in quality. Unlike the discrete manufacturer who can reject a component which fails to meet the required specification, the process manufacturer often has to take whatever turns up. The process is then adjusted, where possible, to bring the finished output inside the acceptable quality bounds.

Even inside the process itself there are factors which will result in minor variations from one batch to another. Slight differences in temperature, time, mixing speed, environ­mental conditions and so on, can influence the resultant output. In most cases these are insignificant, but in others they can affect the marketability of the product.

Some processes can be predicted to produce a range of quality over the length of a process run. As the process stabilizes the quality changes and then settles around a desired point. At some point in time, often due to residue building up or other factors, the quality deteriorates until the process is closed down. The plant is then cleaned down and the process started again.

For a good segment of the fine chemical and chemical market, the customer requires the product to conform to a specified quality.

The specification of "quality" could be a single value, or it can be any number of quality parameters depending on the product and its intended use. In order to meet the custom­ers' requirements, the vendor must have the ability to record against each batch of production a wide range of quality values.

Integrating LIMS

Having accurate and timely quality information on the output is the first stage of improving customer service in this market. The product specification within the process­ing stages should specify what sampling procedures should be undertaken, when they should be done, and how the results should be used. Laboratory Information Manage­ment Systems (LIMS) can be fully integrated into process management systems. The Master Production Schedule can set up a schedule of laboratory tests to be undertaken, can electronically inform the laboratory of the availability of a sample and can electronically inform the production supervisor about the quality information at the end of the test. These data can then be stored with the batch of output for access by customer service personnel.

Integrating LIMS into the overall logistics system also allows the customer service personnel to track back through the batch to verify the sampling procedures used, the tests carried out and the nature of the results achieved. If necessary, this can then be made available to the cus­tomer to assist the customer in their own usage. The Vendor achieves a reputation for both timeliness and accuracy.

Additional customer loyalty can be further achieved where the customer specifies the laboratory tests which will be carried out and the form in which the results will be made available. This could be further extended to a capability to electronically send the results to the customer via an EDI link for verification. This information could then be used within the customer's systems to assist with the usage of the product..

To be Continued