I am sure by now that most people are aware of the impact of the Japan disaster on global supply chains. This article is a very good one, however, and is worth a read. While it seems to be a cross-industry issue, those companies with the best level of agility will be more successful than others.
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It seems the more that the manufacturer uses a Lean/Kanban system, the less inventory they would have of available parts, and thus, the most impacted they would be by this disaster.
Unless by agility you mean the ability to find a new supplier quickly?
It would be interesting in the future if there is a study versus how much money people save on warehouse space with lean versus how much it cost them during supply disruptions.
It could still be cheaper to be Lean overall (for manufacturing) but some of that will have to be taken as a loss related to supply disruptions that impact a Lean organization more than a non Lean one.
Thanks for your comment. By “agility”, and thinking of flexibility of all sorts: ability to shift suppliers, change carriers, re-direct EDI feeds, etc. I like your thoughts about lean vs. non-lean.
How so?
It seems the more that the manufacturer uses a Lean/Kanban system, the less inventory they would have of available parts, and thus, the most impacted they would be by this disaster.
Unless by agility you mean the ability to find a new supplier quickly?
It would be interesting in the future if there is a study versus how much money people save on warehouse space with lean versus how much it cost them during supply disruptions.
It could still be cheaper to be Lean overall (for manufacturing) but some of that will have to be taken as a loss related to supply disruptions that impact a Lean organization more than a non Lean one.
Jordan
Thanks for your comment. By “agility”, and thinking of flexibility of all sorts: ability to shift suppliers, change carriers, re-direct EDI feeds, etc. I like your thoughts about lean vs. non-lean.