A micro transformation initiative can result in macro benefits

One of our recent clients had a production line whose throughput was suffering and they suspected it may be caused by a single process. About 20% of their products went through this one process, where a hole was placed in the side of the product being manufactured.

As a part of our Ideation diagnostic, we used high speed cameras to assess the process and revealed 3 ideas that we implemented:

We moved the location of the activation buttons from a place that required a distinctive motion to one that was in line with natural motions,

We changed a gear ratio for the machine allowing a faster stroke time and

We changed the manner that parts were delivered to the machine.

Sometimes a breakpoint that totally changes a production line can be measured in less than 1 second. In this case, we were transforming something as simple as the position of the activation buttons. One of our client team members thought it was a waste of time, because they would only achieve a savings of 1/2 of one second per product. Once the change was implemented and validated, the throughput results desired were achieved.

FOUR40 Partners partnered with our client to take a small idea to a validated annual benefit of $350K and an ROI for this simple initiative of 12x.

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