In 1997 YKK, the world's largest source of fashion and industrial fastening devices, invested in Crown's AS/400 based Time Recording system at its UK manufacturing plant in Runcorn, Cheshire, and it's head office in London. The success of the project came as no surprise but when YKK identified a need for a Shop-floor Data Collection system they soon found out that Crown had a great deal more to offer!
| Number of employees |
| 300 |
| Business Sector |
| Manufacturing |
| Location |
| Runcorn, Cheshire |
| Product Used |
| FM&C |
| - Time and Attendance |
| - Data Capture |
Using a new Shop-floor Control System based on Crown's FM&C/400 platform, YKK has reduced batch manufacturing times from days to hours, reducing administration costs and improving customer service.
The UK manufacturing plant at Runcorn uses the group's AS/400 based Harmony business planning system to manage the flow of work through the manufacturing process. Historically, Customer Orders have always been planned on a daily basis with all shop-floor paperwork produced overnight by a routine batch process. In practice, this was time-consuming and administratively inefficient.
Fast Order Turnaround
Using the new system, Customer Orders are processed immediately by the Harmony system with Works Orders being produced in small batches as required throughout the day. With real-time communications down to the factory floor, finished goods can now be produced within the hour and delivered promptly to the company's demanding customers. Alan Waterworth, YKK's Project Leader is enthusiastic about the improvements. "Before the Shop-floor System was introduced, the best we could achieve was a one to two day turnaround on our Customer Orders. Now, we can respond to important Orders within the hour if necessary. Needless to say, our customers are delighted"
Bar-code Scanning is the key
The new system links bar-code printers and scanners located in each manufacturing cell with the AS/400 based Harmony system. This enables bar-coded Works Order to be printed directly within the selected cell on demand, eliminating unnecessary administration and paperwork. Production feedback from the factory shop floor is immediate so the company's sales administration staff are completely up-to-date with the progress of all Works Orders through the manufacturing process.
Following a pilot implementation in a first shop-floor cell, the system was soon rolled out to the Nylon Zipper production lines. Work is now in hand to extend the rollout to the Metal Zipper lines. Alan Waterworth concluded, "The shop-floor system has really made an enormous difference. It's completely streamlined the administrative side of our Order management process and has improved customer service significantly"
