Scale With an Eye to Supply
Advance planning is also critical to avoiding supply chain disruptions between prototyping, new product introduction, and ramping production. For rapid prototyping during the “learn-and-burn” phase, engineers should not only collaborate with prototyping suppliers, but also with their final production volume suppliers. Their feedback is essential before committing to a design and investing in verification testing and is a critical step in meeting all qualifications and avoiding cost overruns and delivery delays.
“Supply base development and a company’s revenue growth roadmap need to work hand in hand. Developing a supply base is not a sequential process; it needs to be an iterative process that works in conjunction with a company’s growth plans. It is crucial to understand how the revenue growth strategy affects an organization’s commodity spend profile, how much the commodity profile changes and what strategies are needed to deploy for a future supply base. Coordination of these two processes ensures companies establish a stable foundation for commodities which in turn supports revenue growth plans. Collaboration between an organization’s sales and supplier development teams will accelerate time-to-market and deliver quality that improves patient care.”
— James Reif, Director of Supply Chain Management Solutions, Celestica
For scaling production, preparation is key. One good practice is maintaining a preferred supplier list for all key commodities. These strategic partners have capacity reserves and tooling in place, especially for the production of hard tools that may have a long lead time. When it comes to fast-ramping, it’s critical to get an early understanding of the short- and long-term manufacturing strategies and the clear-to-build plan. How many suppliers will be needed on your available list to really enable rapid scaling?