IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/tky/fseres/97f16.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Preliminary Note on Comparative Lean Production ---Revisiting the Case of Automobile Body Buffer Management---

Author

Listed:
  • Takahiro Fujimoto

    (Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo.)

Abstract

This Paper is a preliminary note on an empirical analysis that compares different interpretations and implementations of so called "lean production system", by different automobile manufacturers in the world. The paper tries to explain why significant inter-firm differences in manufacturing activities exist among the firms that are apparently all moving toward the "lean" manufacturing paradigm. For this purpose, it focused on a specific area in manufacturing management where large quantitative and qualitative differences have been actually observed in recent years: body buffers that the auto assembly makers carry at their assembly plant, including welding, painting, and final assembly processes."," For example, several different patterns of activities for body buffer management have been identified among the European assembly plants, including some Japanese transplants in Europe: (i) Random sequence assembly, Random paint sequence, Emphasizing keeping planned sequence, Emphasizing levelization (Very low pained body buffer levels); (ii) Lot assembly sequence, Lot paint sequence, Emphasizing keeping planned sequence, De-emphasizing levelization, Keeping sequence between the upstream and downstream (Relatively low pained body buffer levels); (iii) Random assembly sequence, Small lot paint sequence, Deviation from planned sequence allowed, Emphasizing levelization, Emphasizing avoidance of assembly line stops, Emphasizing product variety (Relatively low pained body buffer levels); (iv) Random assembly sequence, Lot paint sequence, Deviation from planned sequence allowed (Relatively large pained body buffer levels); (v) Random assembly sequence, Random paint sequence, Emphasizing keeping planned sequence, De-emphasizing levelization, Keeping sequence between the upstream and downstream (Moderate pained body buffer levels). Such a variety indicates that inter-firm learning of effective manufacturing routines is not a simple matter of imitating one best practice -- different strategies, manufacturing traditions, environmental constraints, and capabilities may create different patterns of implementation within the same manufacturing paradigm.

Suggested Citation

  • Takahiro Fujimoto, 1997. "A Preliminary Note on Comparative Lean Production ---Revisiting the Case of Automobile Body Buffer Management---," CIRJE F-Series 97-F-16, CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo.
  • Handle: RePEc:tky:fseres:97f16
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.cirje.e.u-tokyo.ac.jp/research/dp/97/f16/contents.htm
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. WooJin KIM, 2015. "Transformation towards overseas-oriented expansion: the evolution of Hyundai Motor Group’s production structure," Journal of Economics and Political Economy, KSP Journals, vol. 2(2), pages 235-261, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:tky:fseres:97f16. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CIRJE administrative office (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ritokjp.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.