Manufacturing Infrastructure Development

The need for a business to resolve the issues of process choice in line with the manufacturing strategy requirement has been paramount in this book so far. To reiterate, companies must clearly understand which manufacturing processes can best meet the needs of the marketplace, or how well existing processes provide the order-winners and qualifiers for products and/or customers in different segments. However the task facing manufacturing is not simply to choose the process and necessary hardware. Once this has been analysed and the trade-offs reconciled, the emphasis shifts. The company must now ensure that the structure and composition of the component parts, or functions, that provide its necessary internal systems and communications are also developed in line with the manufacturing strategy requirement. Process choice concerns the features of hardware, the tangible ways in which products are manufactured. But the task is more than this. The supporting structures, controls, procedures and other systems within manufacturing are equally necessary for successful, competitive manufacturing performance.