Supply Chain Services
Lowering Costs, Improving Quality, Growing Capacity, Improving Velocity, and Improving the Viability of Suppliers

The Manufacturing Assistance Program Supply Chain services focus on creating and delivering supplier development projects that help build and deploy a common strategy and process across a manufacturer's supply chain. These services are used in existing supply chains or for the creation of new ones. Our goal is to build long-term working relationships with manufacturers to evaluate and improve their supply chains' competitiveness. We use the following model as a way to think about supply chain strategy and deployment.

Supply Chain Operational Excellence Model

(Click to enlarge illustration)

The strategy areas in the model are opportunities for manufacturers and their suppliers to create unique competitive advantage in the marketplace. It is up to the manufacturer to develop this strategy, but it is to the manufacturer's advantage to engage suppliers in the process. For example, if the true expertise for a specific component lies inside a supplier the manufacturer would likely benefit by engaging the supplier to help with new product development. In any case, the model described above requires a change in how manufacturers and their suppliers operate and interact. This is not business as usual where the manufacturer dictates requirements for the supplier. Both the manufacturer and its large and small suppliers need to embrace Continuous Improvement initiatives inside their organizations and between their organizations to optimize the supply chain.

Not all strategy areas need to be addressed in the manufacturer's strategy and not all strategy components need to be addressed with each supplier in the supply chain. Once the strategy areas are selected for inclusion in the manufacturer's strategy the manufacturer can perform an audit of its suppliers to help in the creation of a deployment plan. Based on the deployment plan, Manufacturer/Supplier Steering Committees should be established to use continuous improvement tools and techniques across and inside their respective organizations for operational improvement. Information and ideas are shared between organizations in an effort to optimize results and profits in both organizations. These teams do not disband when the initial effort to achieve the manufacturer's strategy is complete. They remain in place to continually improve their areas of focus.

In some instances, a manufacturer may recognize a common need across all suppliers in the supply chain especially if many of its smaller suppliers have not implemented continuous improvement initiatives inside their organizations. In this case the suppliers need to begin the continuous improvement process with training on the basic continuous improvement tools and methodologies they need to begin the supply chain initiative.

In any case, the Manufacturing Assistance program is positioned to support the manufacturer's program. We offer supply chain:

• Strategy development and deployment
• Supplier remediation
• Score card and metric development and deployment
• Audits
• Tools
• Training

We can help you build and roll out a common strategy and process across your supply chain that will increase profits and long-term viability of all of the companies involved. And, we are independent from the manufacturer. This is often a concern for suppliers that want to ensure that their strategies, operations, techniques and capabilities remain theirs.

Why Use MEP for Your Supply Chain Project?

The Manufacturing Extension Partnership program is nationally recognized for working with manufacturers of all sizes to help them grow, become more efficient and make more money. We use MEP because it offers:

• Geographic Coverage and People — MEP has 60 affiliate organizations that are in every State and in Puerto Rico. These affiliates share resources, techniques and tools and work together to support manufacturers that cross geographic boundaries. MEP can cover your US supply base.

• Reputation for Results — Each year the system reaches more than 30,000 manufacturers and in 2009 the system helped those manufacturers get $8.4 billion in new or retained sales and $1.3 billion in cost savings. No other organization can report these kinds of results exclusively with manufacturers.

• Services and Expertise — MEP system affiliates focus on delivering MEP's Next-Generation manufacturing services that include: Continuous Improvement, Technology Acceleration, Supplier Development, Sustainability, and Workforce. System-wide MEP affiliates employ over 1300 staff and use over 2300 partner service providers. Annually the system completes over 10,000 projects for manufacturers.
  

MAP Services:

• Continuous Improvement
• Supply Chain
• Sustainability
• Workforce