Topics: Manufacturing
December 18, 2017
5 Ways to Reduce Your Manufacturing Inventory Costs
Do you have a CFO breathing down your neck to reduce manufacturing inventory costs? As the VP of Manufacturing, you have one tough job! On one hand, if you don’t have enough of the right inventory on ...
Topics: Manufacturing
December 11, 2017
Better, Faster, Cheaper ERP for Manufacturers
I’m sure you’ve seen that old saying about services. There are only 3 types of services: good, cheap and fast – and you can only pick two:
Topics: Manufacturing
December 05, 2017
5 Myths Busted about ERP for Manufacturers
Manufacturing and ERP systems have had a rocky relationship, one filled with big promises, missed opportunities and lots of misinformation. Companies trying to leverage manufacturing technology for ...
Topics: Manufacturing
October 31, 2017
3 Ways Engineers are Staying on Top of Auto Regulations
Automotive engineers involved in the sales process have a responsibility to ensure that your automotive supply company stays on top of the latest regulations. Changes in regulations often drive ...
Topics: Manufacturing
October 20, 2017
Bridging the Gap: Current Processes & Future Models
When we work with clients to implement lean manufacturing principles, we typically use a software tool called LeanCONNECT (formerly called Areteium). With this tool, we can use existing manufacturing ...
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
October 02, 2017
Increase Quality Without Increasing Production Cost
Razor thin margins leave little room for production errors. Because product recalls and customer refunds are so expensive, you want to be able to consistently deliver quality products, but without ...
Topics: Manufacturing
September 20, 2017
When Lean Manufacturing isn’t Worth the Effort
As a company who has been doing manufacturing ERP implementations and has been evangelizing lean manufacturing principles for a long time, we believe in lean principles, and believe they can be ...
Topics: CRM, ERP, Manufacturing
September 11, 2017
CFOs are demanding modern manufacturing technology
“How do you achieve better profit margins?” That’s the bottom line question for every CFO. Your job is to make sure there’s enough money in the bank to keep operations running smoothly, and to decide ...
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
September 06, 2017
What is ManufacturingCONNECT Accelerator?
Since manufacturing enterprise management software (ERP) was first developed, a truth that “everyone knows” is that implementing new MRP / ERP software is a long, expensive and complicated process.
Topics: CRM, ERP, Manufacturing
September 01, 2017
5 Secrets to Improving Bid Responses for Auto Suppliers
Automotive supplier sales reps and engineers spend a lot of time responding to RFPs (Requests for Proposals). With so much time and energy going into formulating each response, what can you do to ...
Topics: Manufacturing
August 28, 2017
Life After Moving to a Modern ERP System
Anytime you switch out your ERP system, you can expect a certain amount of grumbling. Change doesn’t come easy to most people! But if you are moving off an older system that hasn’t been upgraded in a ...
Topics: Manufacturing
August 24, 2017
Starting your Lean Manufacturing Journey
Every journey begins with a first step. And the first step is deciding, “Where do I want to go?” Lean Manufacturing is a process that is designed to take your manufacturing production from supplier ...
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
August 01, 2017
The Fastest Way to “Go Live” on Dynamics 365!
A typical ERP implementation may take months, even years, to deploy. But Microsoft has made it possible for companies choosing Microsoft Dynamics 365 to go live in just weeks!
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
June 15, 2017
Auto Manufacturers are Bucking the Profit Erosion Trend
Are your profits eroding slowly over time? For automotive suppliers and other manufacturers who sell to giant corporations, profit erosion is a common problem. There’s no one big issue that can get ...
Topics: Manufacturing
June 02, 2017
Still running MAPICS?
Make the move to Microsoft Dynamics 365 MAPICS, now owned by Infor and re-branded as XA, has been a leading ERP manufacturing solution for several decades now. Many of the largest manufacturers in ...
Topics: Manufacturing
May 12, 2017
Is Your Auto ERP System Keeping You From Increasing Revenue?
Automotive suppliers who manufacture and sell their products to large automobile manufacturers can sometimes feel squeezed. Automobile manufacturers can be demanding clients – they can request lots ...
Topics: Manufacturing
April 27, 2017
How to Shorten the Bid Process and Close Deals Faster
As a company that frequently works with automotive supply manufacturers to implement technology systems, we find that while some companies have mastered the manufacturing production process, very few ...
Topics: Manufacturing
April 13, 2017
Auto Supplier CEOs Use Tech as a Competitive Advantage
The best CEOs have a firm grasp of the big picture and understand enough of the details to know how to adjust course to meet the company’s goals. Your success as a CEO largely depends on your ability ...
Topics: Manufacturing
March 01, 2017
6 Ways Manufacturers Can Improve Business Agility
Business agility is the name of the manufacturing game! How do you keep agile so you can capitalize on opportunities, while making sure you have enough finished product to meet demand? Here are 6 ...
Topics: Manufacturing
March 01, 2017
Is your biggest manufacturing constraint your ERP system?
Recognizing and overcoming manufacturing constraints is one of the main jobs of running any manufacturing operation. You have your standard:
Topics: Manufacturing
March 01, 2017
5 Costly Manufacturing KPI Mistakes CFOs Make
Being a numbers-driven manufacturing CFO is a good thing – in fact, it’s essential. But as a CFO, you probably know finance and operations more than you know the ins-and-outs of manufacturing, which ...
Topics: Manufacturing
January 24, 2017
HBD Manufacturing with MCA Connect & Microsoft
HBD Industries Selects Microsoft Dynamics 365 and MCA Connect to Enable World-Class Manufacturing Operations
Topics: Manufacturing
January 24, 2017
Value Stream Mapping: Do your materials move by magic?
Does your lean manufacturing value stream map include movement of materials between processes?
Topics: Manufacturing
September 28, 2016
Lean Production Scheduling in Dynamics 365
Let’s look in some detail at production scheduling for lean manufacturing in Dynamics AX. If you haven’t read my blog series on production scheduling supporting lean principles, I encourage you to ...
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
August 31, 2016
Production Scheduling – Level the Volume
This post is part of our series discussing the 7 lean manufacturing guidelines. In this post we’ll discuss supermarkets as a way to design a lean future state.
Topics: Manufacturing
August 19, 2016
Production Scheduling – Level the Mix
This post is part of our series discussing the 7 lean manufacturing guidelines. In this post we’ll discuss supermarkets as a way to design a lean future state.
Topics: Manufacturing
August 02, 2016
Production Scheduling – Schedule at One Point
This post is part of our series discussing the 7 lean manufacturing guidelines. In this post we’ll discuss supermarkets as a way to design a lean future state.
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
July 26, 2016
Production Scheduling – Supermarkets and Pull
This post is part of our series discussing the 7 lean manufacturing guidelines. In this post we’ll discuss supermarkets as a way to design a lean future state.
Topics: Manufacturing
July 26, 2016
5 Ways Manufacturers Can Increase Customer Loyalty
Most manufacturers and distributors don’t place enough focus on driving customer loyalty. Sure, if you are a manufacturer, you want repeat business, but where customers get the most frustrated is the ...
Topics: Manufacturing
July 15, 2016
Manufacturing Re-Imagined
How can manufacturing ERP systems and related technologies solve manufacturing challenges using new approaches? That was the question our manufacturing experts answered at “Manufacturing ...
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
July 14, 2016
Production Scheduling – Building to Takt
This is the second post in our series discussing the 7 lean manufacturing guidelines. The first guideline is to design a lean future state by producing to your takt time.
Topics: Manufacturing
July 12, 2016
Production Scheduling – 7 Lean Principles
The other day I came across an early version of the Lean Enterprise Institute’s “Learning to See” workshop from 1999. The workshop listed seven guidelines for the design of a future state value ...
Topics: Manufacturing
July 06, 2016
Manufacturing Feeling Squeezed?
Why is it that every time I am out with customers I end up with something new to blog about? Probably because I am insanely curious about each customer as I look to creatively help them to improve ...
Topics: Manufacturing
March 30, 2016
Configurators: NPI Every Time All the Time
Maybe it’s because we specialize in high mix manufacturing or maybe there are just more of them out there, but we are increasingly working with companies with highly configurable products who want to ...
Topics: Manufacturing
February 19, 2016
Kanban Cards or MRP?
OK so the title of this article was incendiary and just a ploy to get you here. Sorry. Instead of another vitriolic diatribe on the glories of kanban over MRP I want to look at a very specific ...
Topics: Manufacturing
September 04, 2015
Using an LTS to Sustain Lean Manufacturing Benefits
What’s an LTS? It’s the acronym for Lean Transformation Software. While LTS is not as well-known as other acronyms in our industry like ERP, CRM, MRP, PowerBI, etc – it should be – because LTS ...
Topics: ERP, Manufacturing
September 01, 2015
MCA Connect is 2015 Microsoft AX Manufacturing Partner
DENVER, CO Sept 1, 2015 Last month, Microsoft proudly announced the United States Microsoft Dynamics Partner Award winners during the US Microsoft Dynamics Annual Conference. “The US Partner Awards ...
Topics: Manufacturing
October 24, 2014
AXUG and Beyond with Technology for Lean
Last week’s AXUG Summit in St. Louis was a great opportunity to check in on the state of lean in the Dynamics AX community and beyond. Some perspectives: Manufacturers with lots of variation and ...
Topics: Manufacturing
September 22, 2014
When Lean Needs a Technology Assist
Lean is often portrayed as “common sense” for manufacturing. Indeed, lean tools emphasize simple visual practices that are easy to learn and easy to use. What could be simpler than using a kanban ...
Topics: Manufacturing
July 07, 2014
Lean Beyond the Checklist
Let’s face it, ERP products are massive affairs. They have to be in order to support the breadth of functions across an enterprise and business requirements across industries. The selection of an ERP ...
