Thesis (M.B.A.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management; and, (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering; in conjunction with the Leaders for Manufacturing Program at MIT, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 73-74). / Manufacturing Flexibility is a broad term used to describe a metric that can be measured in many different ways. Current industry experts agree that Flexibility is one of the key measures that will help the automotive industry reduce current overcapacity and remain competitive. In addition to flexibility, General Motors is also focusing on fewer, interbuildable product architectures.To maintain and implement flexible manufacturing systems, General Motors has developed a list of Flexibility Enablers. These enablers identify critical product characteristics which affect the interbuildability of the product and the flexibility and of the subsequent manufacturing process.Market forces drive product requirements, and lead to designs that potentially violate the Flexibility Enablers. This thesis will look at GM's internal structure and how it has developed to support design decisions and issue resolution. It will then study cases in which the design requirements led to design, manufacturing and cost tradeoffs in an attempt to understand and document the different unwritten resolution processes in disparate groups.Keywords: Manufacturing Flexibility, Product Development, Flexibility Enabler, Interbuildability. / by Grace C. Tomlin. / S.M. / M.B.A.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:MIT/oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/44306 |
| Date | January 2008 |
| Creators | Tomlin, Grace C. (Grace Catherine) |
| Contributors | Warren Seering and Eric Rebentisch., Leaders for Manufacturing Program., Leaders for Manufacturing Program at MIT, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sloan School of Management |
| Publisher | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| Source Sets | M.I.T. Theses and Dissertation |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | 75 p., application/pdf |
| Rights | M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission., http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582 |
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