Future shape of the responsive manufacturing enterprise

The paper seeks to report on some of the preliminary results of an ongoing scoping study into the shape of the manufacturing enterprise of the future.

This paper evolved through a combination of literature review, focused group discussions, interviews and a questionnaire survey of six aerospace companies in the UK. It is primarily an attempt to provide a broad framework for synthesizing some of the information generally available as a contribution to the current debate regarding the future of manufacturing systems.

The results to date show that the product development process and supply network efficiency are the two most significant domains influencing manufacturing responsiveness. Within those domains, customer driven product development and supply chain design, intelligent and flexible technology, producibility analysis, integrated product and process development and the concurrency of the extended manufacturing enterprise are considered as the most significant elements towards achieving responsiveness. In addition a Responsive Manufacturing Model (RMM) is provided.

The RMM reported in the paper is at an early state of development and the work is ongoing to refine it further. The development of appropriate measures and methods of assessment for the various facets and attributes of manufacturing responsiveness is an important step towards full model development which is still to be addressed.

The process of structuring the various elements influencing manufacturing responsiveness into logical groups in a hierarchical model has proved very useful during model development. It proved a significant aid during the focused group discussions and interviews that preceded completion of the questionnaire. The results to date are very encouraging and provide several interesting insights into the domains and elements of manufacturing responsiveness and the relative importance attached to them in the UK aerospace sector.

The work was funded by EPSRC (IMI) research grant as it was the first attempt in this field over within the UK. The proposed model and the obtained results have led to another research project funded by EPSRC over three years to further investigate the proposed model and the implication of its implementation.