In last class, we had the Lego task in which we have to prepare our warehouse considering three factors; Inbound, Operations and Outbound. The task was helpful as with the Lego, we can modify it whenever we want from the feedback of professor and other students. But what if something happen to actual warehouse or a manufacturing site? What could be consequences on the customers?
During our visit to Ford, we saw that all assembling of different parts of a car is been done by robots or automated machine. There were hardly 1-2 workers to control the machine and the work was going smooth. The fully automated assembly machine helped Ford for efficient performance and increase the number of output. On the other hand, this automated machine create problem for another car company Tesla. The CEO of Tesla Elon Musk tweeted, “Yes, excessive automation at Tesla was a mistake. To be precise, my mistake. Humans are underrated.”
We all know Tesla. It a company specializes in electric vehicles. Recently, Tesla has shut down the production of Model 3 second time in 3 months. First time it was paused to increase the output and this time it is again paused to modify and improve automation. The assembly line that packages battery cells at the company’s gigafactory near the town of Reno, Nevada, has struggled because of mistake of a subcontractor. There is a problem in software and changes have to be done in mechanical and electrical elements.
Company has to produce 2500 cars a week in April but they only produced 2000 cars a week and unable to meet its production goal. Now production is again on hold. Moreover, stock has reduced more than quarter.
This kind of problem occurs in big companies but it is important to see how the problem is being solved and how product is being delivered to the customer on time.
More information on:
The blog of Logistics at MGEPS at UPV 