QUALITY IMPROVEMENT - AUTOMOTIVE

Overview

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Our client BMW Mini manufactures the iconic Mini, based in Oxford UK.  They were having many problems with the soft-top convertible roof system and experiencing a high numbers of defects due to multiple quality characteristics, and high volumes of inventory which needed re-working every time a quality issue was identified.  The component supplier was not only failing their quality targets but they were also making a financial loss on this part. 

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Solution

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• Defect reduction: using root-cause analysis and 8D techniques we were able to manage quality issues; identifying the process root-causes and implemented effective solutions.

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• Inventory reduction: using just-in-time techniques and designed a new planning process.

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• Cycle time reduction: Value stream techniques were used to identify the non-value added time which could then be designed out of the process to reduce cycle time.

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Outcome

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• 39 open quality issues were reduced to 4.

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• Quality metric performance improved and the supplier was removed from the ‘exit-list.’ 

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• Inventory levels reduced from 3 days to 1 day.

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• 6 minutes was removed from the component cycle time.