Right this moment’s producers have to be agile, to allow them to modify to an evolving world market with altering buyer expectations and more and more numerous, and infrequently particular, calls for. Assembly these specialised wants requires producers to embrace an environment friendly and efficient manufacturing technique, like engineer-to-order (ETO) manufacturing.
This information explains ETO manufacturing. It compares ETO to make-to-order manufacturing. It additionally discusses the benefits and drawbacks of ETO. Lastly, it gives some real-world examples.
What’s Engineer-to-Order Manufacturing?
ETO manufacturing is a customer-driven manufacturing course of that produces distinctive options.
In contrast to stocked merchandise, ETO merchandise are made to satisfy particular buyer wants. They undergo cautious engineering and design planning earlier than manufacturing begins.
Although the time, vitality, and ability concerned in creating ETO merchandise could appear price prohibitive, producing advanced, specialised items permits producers to demand increased costs and achieve a aggressive benefit within the market.
The method circulate for ETO manufacturing can change based mostly on the trade and firm. Nevertheless, there are some fundamental steps that every one ETO producers observe:
- Buyer request and evaluation: The shopper introduces their product must the producer, who makes use of this time to assemble necessities and provide concerns.
- Preliminary design: The producer creates a preliminary design that matches the client’s specs.
- Detailed engineering: As soon as the preliminary design is permitted, the producer’s engineering staff creates an in depth design, which incorporates drawings, fashions, and specs.
- Manufacturing planning and procurement: Manufacturing planning, together with the procurement of supplies and parts wanted, is the subsequent step.
- Manufacturing and meeting: When all plans are in place and assets are procured, manufacturing commences, and the product is totally assembled.
- Testing: It’s important that the product is examined rigorously, making certain that it adheres to the detailed necessities and meets high quality assurance requirements earlier than being delivered to the client.
- Supply, set up, and assessment: The completed product is delivered to the client and put in. If the client and producer agree, the client can test the product. This test is for accuracy and high quality. It occurs throughout the assessment part.
Obtain ETO Product Sheet
Engineer-to-Order: Benefits and Disadvantages
There are a number of benefits that include ETO manufacturing, together with increased potential earnings, environment friendly manufacturing, fewer errors, and elevated buyer satisfaction. However such specialised manufacturing processes create a couple of disadvantages as effectively.
Examples embrace longer lead instances for designing, planning, and constructing; increased prices revolving round customization and the potential have to develop new techniques; and decreased scalability as a consequence of constructing distinctive merchandise for a single buyer fairly than for mass manufacturing.
Make-to-Order vs Engineer-to-Order
Like engineer-to-order, make-to-order (MTO) is a broadly used manufacturing course of. MTO manufacturing begins with a buyer’s order, however, in contrast to ETO, MTO customizes a pre-specified design.
Contemplate the client who’s available in the market for a luxurious automotive. The shopper begins with a fundamental automotive. They’ll change some particulars based mostly on the producer. These particulars embrace the engine, inside, exterior, and leisure system.
An ideal instance is BMW. The German automaker permits clients to design their “final driving machine,” beginning with deciding on the sequence and following the steps—together with colour, wheel sort, and fabric—till the ultimate worth is quoted.
Each MTO and ETO are customizable and versatile in nature, however solely ETO manufacturing permits clients to be part of the design course of from the get-go.
Actual-World Examples of Engineer-to-Order
Within the development trade, ETO is widespread for customized builds. Constructing a novel construction begins with the preliminary imaginative and prescient. This imaginative and prescient involves life throughout the design course of, which incorporates in depth engineering and customizations. As soon as the plan is permitted, the supplies are sourced, and the development commences—a one-of-a-kind constructing is on its strategy to standing tall.
The aerospace trade additionally makes use of ETO manufacturing. Boeing and Airbus, the world’s largest producers of enormous industrial passenger plane, take detailed orders from airways, working with them to design a product that fulfills their specialised requests. The planes are crafted from starting to finish based mostly on the client’s avionic, exterior, and inside expectations.
For the medical trade, specialised tools and gadgets are sometimes required. Prospects on this trade select ETO producers as a result of they provide flexibility and customization. They belief that the ultimate merchandise will meet their wants.
And the HVAC trade presents ETO manufacturing examples, as effectively. Some producers design customized HVAC techniques, like Acumatica buyer Q-PAC Techniques, Inc.
Q-PAC makes Plug-and-Play fan techniques utilized in industrial HVAC techniques for air dealing with retrofits and OEMs. The techniques are designed based mostly on buyer specs and may be present in workplace buildings, universities, airports, hospitals, and leisure venues.
Although Q-PAC had its personal ordering system named QUIPS, the corporate was managing manufacturing and prices and monitoring stock with QuickBooks and Excel spreadsheets. The staff struggled to trace the standing of orders, quote initiatives, course of engineering modifications, assemble payments of supplies, forecast, and extra.
The disconnected, inefficient techniques precipitated frustration, so Q-PAC sought a cloud-based enterprise useful resource planning (ERP) resolution that would connect with QUIPS, supplied multi-region help, was scalable, and allowed them to customise distinctive processes.
After Q-PAC evaluated a number of top-tier choices, together with Microsoft Dynamics, Odoo, Oracle NetSuite, and Acumatica, Acumatica’s unlimited-user pricing, open APIs, ease-of-use, flexibility, and seamless integration with third-party purposes clinched the deal. Q-PAC carried out Acumatica Manufacturing Version, gaining quite a lot of key advantages within the course of, together with:
- Instantaneous—anytime, wherever—entry to a single file of data.
- Actual-time reporting.
- Seamless connection between QUIPS and Acumatica Manufacturing, permitting engineering, manufacturing, transport, and invoicing knowledge to circulate between the 2 purposes.
- Visibility into stock and manufacturing prices.
- Quicker manufacturing and improved revision historical past entry by way of Invoice of Supplies performance.
Q-PAC now imports its design specs from QUIPS immediately into Acumatica, which automates the method of making the manufacturing necessities and work orders for the subassemblies that finally roll up right into a remaining meeting. Acumatica gives visibility, so everybody sees whether or not parts are in inventory and what capability is required for a venture. Acumatica permits Q-PAC to see correct stock and manufacturing prices, which permits executives to calculate the venture profitability appropriately.
Conclusion
ETO manufacturing is a extremely specialised method that gives expansive engineering and customization to clients with distinctive product wants. Producers who select this feature can get forward of their rivals. They’ll ship the precise product that clients need. This ensures buyer satisfaction, which builds loyalty and will increase earnings.
