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Lean Initiatives
Some of the lean initiatives mentioned in this website may not seem new or necessarily lean in themselves. Examples are Design for Manufacture or Develop Strategic Supply Partners. But, they are basic to reducing design time to market and order fulfillment time consistently.
Why? Just as dependable blocking and tackling are basic to moving the football up the field quickly, dependable execution by engineering, manufacturing, and suppliers is required to give customers what they want, on-time, every time. Trying to implement mass customization or cut throughput times drastically without having sound processes will lead to frustration.
| 38% of CEOs worldwide say structure and business processes are the
greatest obstacles to pushing e-business initiatives inside their company.
- AT Kearney study of 251 CEOs, Business Week/September 18, 2000 |
Internet and Information Systems
Every lean initiative will be enabled by the vastly improved communications made possible by modern information technology. And the Internet has recently made flexible, inexpensive, and ubiquitous communication available to anyone with the vision to use it effectively.
| Each custom order can require a slightly different mix of parts for the
final product, and that triggers dozens or even hundreds of purchase orders
to parts and materials suppliers. "If you tried to handle all this on paper
and over the phone, it would never get done," says Schmitt. "Computers have
to talk to other computers."
- Business Week/October 4, 1999 |
| It's no wonder others are looking to Cisco for advice. The company
saves more than $800 million annually - or 20% of its yearly profit - by
using the Web for everything from controlling inventories to managing finances
to recruiting. That's on top of the $40 million a day in Web sales - 90%
of its orders - that makes Cisco the world's largest e-commerce player.
- Business Week E.BIZ/September 18, 2000
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| B-webs are the mechanisms for the accumulation of digital capital, the
knowledge- and relationship-based currency of the new economy.
- Digital Capital, Tapscott, Ticoll, and Lowy |