Introduction
With multiple projects vying for your budgetary dollars, you need to scrutinize every purchase you approve. When evaluating SPC software, we believe there are three critical areas you must consider when looking at SPC software:
1. Implementation Time and Return-On-Investment (ROI)
2. Increase in Production Efficiency
3. Improvement in Corporate Profitability
In this three part series, we will discuss each topic in more detail so you can see how these are necessary in your choice of SPC solutions. In the 2nd part of our “SPC Software That Provides More Than ROI” series, we will discuss how SPC software aids to increase production efficiency.
Part 2 – Increase in Production Efficiency
According to Jack B. ReVelle, Ph.D., ASQ Fellow, and Author of “Quality Essentials: A Reference Guide from A to Z” the Cost of Quality (COQ) has numerous hidden costs to the company:
- Research shows that Cost of Poor Quality (CoPQ) can range from 15 to 40 percent of business costs, e.g., rework, returns / complaints, reduced service levels, & lost revenue
- Most businesses don’t know what their quality costs are because they don’t keep reliable statistics
- Finding & correcting mistakes consumes an inordinately large portion of resources
- Typically, the cost to eliminate a failure in the customer phase is 5X greater than it is at the development or manufacturing phase
- Effective quality management decreases production costs since the sooner an error is found and corrected, the less costly it will be
(Source: “reprinted from ‘ASQ Seminar=Cost of Quality’ by Dr. Jack B. ReVelle, www.ReVelleSolutions.com”)
How does SPC software increase production efficiency? Here are the experiences of our customers:
Reducing Defects and Downtime
Automatic email notifications
“Automatic email notifications have really made my life easier. Now, I don’t have to wait for someone to tell me when something is out-of-control. In fact, when we have auditors come in, I deliberately take them to a station running Synergy, put in an out-of-specification condition; an automatic email goes out to my email that I show the auditor. They are very impressed,” commented Kate Bryant of Bright Plastics.
Downtime
“Previously, we would have to pull the product, sort the product, figure out what happened, pay 3 days of overtime, as well as repair the machine. Since using Synergy from Zontec, our product return rate has dropped to less than half of a percent of what we are currently shipping,” said Heidi Beaver of Portage Plastics.
Empower Operators
“With Synergy, the operators have the visibility to make decisions at their stage in the process. This allows the operators to be proactive versus reactive about issues,” said Tim Stutzman of Oregon Freeze Dry.
Rejects
“Since implementing Synergy we have reduced our rejects by 2/3rds,” remarked Bob Batsche of Carlisle & Finch Co.
Scrap
“Bright Plastics has experienced an integral reduction in its scrap rate by 40% in the last two years and is now able to meet increasing customer requests immediately. This reduction is due in part to the use of the Synergy. I couldn’t be more pleased with the performance of the Synergy product.” commented Kate Bryant of Bright Plastics.
Providing Historical Data Instantly
“One of the ways that Synergy helps me is retrieving information quickly. If I received a customer complaint, previously I would have to go back through the paper files to find the information, the date it was made, the lot#, etc. Now, I can quickly look it up in the system on that date to see if there were any problems on that day. Synergy has easily saved me hours of time,” remarked Scott Chambers of Schoeneck Containers.
Helping to Improve Compliance and Validation
For the automotive industry, the Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG) is the standard for capability requirements. “Typically, the standard is Cpk of 1.67; however, our internal goal is to be greater than 2. Synergy has really helped us with quality system compliance,” commented Don Bartlett of Grakon LLC.
Simplifying Audits to Improve Customer Confidence and Satisfaction
“We are able to show our customers in real-time that their product is “in control”. We bring every customer to an SPC station where they can view the data live. Without Synergy, we wouldn’t be able to do that. I use Synergy to demonstrate that our processes are in control,” said Mike Woznicki of SPIROL International.
Increasing Percent of On-Time Delivery
“Before we implemented Synergy, there was a risk of what we had stock in the pipeline that was out-of-specification and we wouldn’t know about it for a week,” commented Ted Black of A.P. Plasman-Windsor Plant.
Summary
Our goal with this series is to help you see the many ways an SPC software can not only pay for itself, but also will continue to do so, as well as consistently decrease your CoPQ and help you win new business.