As recently as the late 1990s, most manufacturing was based on the premise that the best way to run a plant was to make products in batches, the bigger the better.

"In the late '90s, manufacturing was looked at as a cost to be controlled," says Jeff Hutchinson, a partner with consulting firm Accenture. "It wasn't looked at strategically."

That idea worked well when finished goods went to a distribution center while a sales force convinced the market it wanted those products.

But as we move toward a demand-driven market, where manufacturers strive to produce goods they know their customers want, a new strategic view of manufacturing is emerging, one that recognizes that manufacturing is part of the broader supply chain.

"Manufacturing is still one of the greatest costs in an organization," Hutchinson says. "But in the current business environment, what separates you from your competitors is your complete supply chain."

The results of that new view, Hutchinson adds, are new practices that generate flexible, responsive and homogenous solutions across an entire manufacturing network, whether a company manufactures from one domestic plant or from a series of plants and contract manufacturers across the globe.

Here's a look at how innovative manufacturers featured in the pages of Modern Materials Handling are adapting their operations using four of those practices: better data collection, targeted automation, managing the global supply chain and just-in-time/just-in-sequence.

In addition to meeting Wal-Mart's mandate, Jack Link's is using RFID to manage its own processes.

"We began discussing RFID shortly after the Wal-Mart mandates were announced," says Karl Paepke, vice president of operations. "Once we understood its potential benefits, we said: If RFID can achieve this sort of traceability across the supply chain, we can use it to meet similar objectives internally."

To comply with the Wal-Mart mandate, Jack Link's installed an RFID label printer, reader hardware and an RFID middleware solution to filter RFID data. That allows the snack producer to use RFID information to drive label printing.

But Jack Link's is also deploying processes for internal lot traceability, beginning with containers of raw materials tagged at the receiving dock. Those RFID-tagged containers will be read for lot traceability, work-in-process status and process factors such as changes in weight.

"This new information will tell us exactly where a given container is in the process, and what vendor the material in that bin came from," says Paepke.

The end result will be fully-automated lot traceability if problems should ever occur. The system will also feed real-time work-in-process information to managers.

Targeted automation:One issue many manufacturers are struggling with is whether to relocate manufacturing operations to low wage regions or to automate existing facilities to improve productivity and increase throughput without adding to overhead.

At JTM's new plant, a robotic palletizer handles more than 200,000 pails and 150,000 cases per year.

"With an automatic palletizer, we no longer need somebody at the end of the line and we don't have to add any personnel as the business continues to grow," says Dan Schodowski, president and CEO.

Economical electronics and more sophisticated controls systems are part of the reason companies can target specific areas of the plant where volumes may not have previously justified automation. At JTM, for instance, the control system can be programmed for a variety of pallet build patterns and production rates, depending upon the product coming down the line.

Managing the global supply chain: For companies like C.R. Bard, manufacturing is a global affair (A tale of two ERP systems). Four years ago, Bard implemented an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system to manage the production of medical devices, which often pass through separate facilities for manufacturing, packaging, sterilization and distribution. Work on a catheter, for instance, may begin at a manufacturing facility in Monks Corner, S.C.; move next to Nogales, Mexico, for packaging; travel to Covington, Ga., for sterilization; and finally end up at a distribution center in Covington for shipment to a customer.

Bard's ERP system treats each location like a series of workstations in a single facility - that's true whether the facility is a plant in South Carolina, a packaging facility in Mexico or sterlization and distribution locations in Georgia.

Today, an order begins as a work order in the ERP system. Facility-based manufacturing systems will direct processes between workstations inside a facility and update the ERP system in near real time.

The ERP system, however, routes and tracks the product between facilities until it arrives at the warehouse. There, a WMS takes over.

The WMS has real-time visibility into the status of an order right down to the location of containers on the conveyor system. Although the ERP isn't updated until an order is shipped, customer service personnel can access status information through Web screens.

Just-in-time/just-in-sequence: Delphi developed a solution that combines a sophisticated supply chain management software system, automated materials handling and a third-party logistics (3PL) provider, ARD, to deliver wiring harnesses just-in-time and just-in-sequence (JIT/JIS) to the Mercedes manufacturing campus near Cottondale, Al.(From Juarez to Cottondale) 

The system represents a major change in focus for Delphi, according to Gary DeArment, manager of the auto parts giant's JIT/JIS Centers in North America. "In the past, our primary focus was on the processes within the walls of a manufacturing plant," DeArment explains. "Now, we have to manage the entire value stream."

Few industries are as competitive as the auto industry. That's one of the reasons lean manufacturing took hold first on the automotive assembly line.

To drive further efficiencies, automakers are asking suppliers like Delphi to synchronize manufacturing activities with the auto assembly line. Parts are not only delivered just-in-time, but also in the same sequence as the vehicles being assembled.

Operators at ARD use a lift assist device to load totes in sequence onto returnable plastic pallets for delivery as the totes exit the AS/RS.	Up to 2,640 harnesses are kept in an AS/RS and then sequenced for just-in-time delivery to a nearby DaimlerChrysler plant.

On the day of delivery, the AS/RS delivers to an output conveyor in the exact sequence they will be required on the line. The system delivers a tote with a harness every 54 seconds.