CDC Factory

Converting Intelligence into Action

Nothing weakens strategic vision faster than poor execution. A factory floor that is able to respond and take action rapidly provides a distinct competitive advantage in today's fast moving markets. Achieving the continuous support of shop floor teams is the key to successful and lasting improvement initiatives.

CDC Factory focuses on making action unavoidable by enabling focused improvement programs and making software use habitual on the factory floor.

Shop floor focused improvement programs

CDC Factory combines the practices of Kaizen and Six Sigma into a packaged, action-orientated solution proven to deliver performance benefits within 2 weeks of going live. Focused on the immediate 'quick wins,' factory floor teams take ownership of opportunities, implement routines and rituals to review performance and learn the key tools and techniques to identify root cause solutions.

Typical techniques include:

  • Lean- and Six Sigma using a DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) framework
  • Kaizen workshops focused on set-up/changeover reductions
  • Root Cause Analysis
  • SMED (Single Minute Exchange of Die)
  • Short Interval Control (SIC) methods

Through a combination of real-time manufacturing intelligence and multi-disciplinary scenario-led workshops, we eliminate guesswork about when and how to use these tools – drastically reducing implementation times. Sustainability is assured through improved supervisory leadership skills. A rigorous adoption of a performance review cycle using the CDC Factory Improve ensures visual accountability throughout the entire enterprise.

Within 2 weeks of the implementation, you can typically expect to:

  • Experience a 5-10% productivity jump by enabling the shop floor teams to visualize real-time operations performance
  • Cut changeover time by 45%
  • Deliver a direct $60K financial benefit from an improvement campaign that cost only $2,000

The benefits of CDC Factory extend far beyond the plant. CDC factory enables manufacturers in process-intensive industries to:

  • Share the wins by replicating site improvement processes, methods and intelligence across the entire plant network
  • Foster a 'Best in Class' culture of friendly competitiveness and information sharing throughout the organization. Create a reward system based on visual performance targets that the factory floor can directly impact
  • Develop enterprise-wide shop floor training and up-skill programs based on pre-defined proven working practices
  • Maximize the value of external consultancies by utilizing a centralized engine to establish, monitor and review many concurrent initiatives
  • Prioritize Strategic Capital investments by identifying performance opportunities across SKUs, assets, processes and materials through the adoption of the CDC Factory Analytics module.

Making software use habitual on the factory floor

We recognize that software that is easy to use can fall into a state of disuse. This can occur when the software feels unnatural or it doesn't provide immediate value for the day-to-day user. Our mission has always been to make software use automatic, natural and beneficial – a habitual part of the day job.

To achieve this, our software design and engineering has gone much further than creating simple-to-use screens. Simplicity is critical on the factory floor but we have also worked with behavioral and industrial specialists to analyze each role in the factory and map out the information that causes workplace anxiety in each role.

This anxiety is most often caused by a lack of clear and immediate visibility into the root cause of common problems. This results in a sense of not being in control. The sense of not being in control is usually compounded by factory workers perceiving that they have little or no voice for issues and opportunities to be heard and that they will be lost in the filtration of middle management. As a result, factory workers lack a sense of ownership and responsibility and seldom take steps to resolve basic problems at the source where the scope can be contained and the resulting value in terms of cost savings can be most significant.

In addition to collecting the essential information for corporate analysis, such as OEE, and SKU cost profiles CDC Factory is designed to provide real-time information flow that returns a sense of being 'in control' and removes anxiety. Factory floor workers have real-time status of current line performance metrics, including cost-per-unit, and the ability to call for maintenance response immediately with the authority take remedial action as the production run is occurring. Operators forget about the managerial uses of the information and value the software for what it does for them personally

Companies seeking to verify the potential performance gains with CDC Factory can take advantage of our Factory Performance Audit and Benchmark.  This workshop pinpoints specific areas of improvement, cost reductions and key performance metrics relevant to your factory.