Production

The federal government can and should play a much bigger role in helping American companies regain the lead in manufacturing. We need to invest a commensurate amount of federal R&D dollars in advanced manufacturing technologies as we do in other areas of science, technology, and engineering. The last administration created an assistant secretary for manufacturing […]

Now that providing services is more lucrative than making products, the old foundations for success in manufacturing are crumbling. Smart manufacturers are creating new business models to capture profits at the customer’s end of the value chain.

What will it take to reverse a decades-long shift to global supply chains?

Last week I participated for the first time in the Aspen Ideas Festival, and it was an amazing experience. Each year the Aspen Institute brings together...

Japanese companies are very, very good at manufacturing. A decade ago this was new and disturbing to Western managers. The Japanese had captured a substantial share of the U.S. automobile market, offering features, fits, and finishes at prices domestic producers were unable to match. Similar trends appeared in machine tools, copiers, and numerous other industries. […]

Outdated cost accounting and management control systems are an obstacle to the lasting success of new manufacturing technologies and procedures. They...

It's not straightforward, but technology will get you there.

As retailers adopt lean retailing practices, manufacturers are feeling the pinch. Retailers no longer place large seasonal orders for goods in advance--instead,...

American industry is beginning to put its manufacturing house in order. Companies building high-volume standardized products like copiers, appliances, and automobiles are learning from their foreign rivals and emulating their commitment to ongoing product and process innovation. But one important segment of U.S. industry—job shop manufacturers—continues to postpone needed reforms. Many of these companies have […]

To reduce high manufacturing overhead, companies should look beyond their direct labor and materials costs to the costs of transactions. These transactions...

Even in this contentious election year, all sides agree on one issue: The loss of American manufacturing jobs over the past decade has been a disaster...

Deep tech, which combines physical and digital technologies, is moving out of the lab and into real-world supply chains.

In the wake of Covid-19's disruptions, Kshore, a Chinese appliance maker, is thinking of realigning its supply chain. Like many other global manufacturers,...

As global competition grows ever fiercer in manufacturing industries, American managers are adopting a new battle cry: “Beat ’em with technology or move—over there.” Indeed, since 1975, the boom in information-intensive processing technologies has been explosive. A close look at how U.S. managers are actually using these technologies, however, silences their battle cry in a […]

In the 1990s, manufacturing companies face the challenge of globally integrating their operations. Just as companies were forced to rationalize operations within individual plants in the 1980s, they must now do the same for their entire system of manufacturing facilities around the world. Multinationals that can no longer rely on sheer size and geographic reach […]

Especially for smaller companies.

Following up on his pledge to provide greater support for manufacturing in his State of the Union address, President Obama has announced a proposal to cut the effective tax rate for manufacturers to 25%. A number of economists howled against this so-called “industrial policy” and criticized the president’s singling out manufacturing for “special treatment” — […]

If there is anything more powerful than an idea whose time has come, it is one that is the product of wishful thinking. Ask any manager or management consultant what the related essentials of manufacturing reform are, and the answer will likely come back: a just-in-time approach to eliminating waste, rigorous statistical process control to […]

A growing number of executives of U.S.-based companies are repatriating their manufacturing capabilities - moving some production operations back from...

Sometimes, PR moves end up having bigger-than-anticipated effects. Just look at auto manufacturing in the South.