A great article on the reason to buy American cars.

[rwhite692]

Hi Darren, what I was trying to say is that in this day and age, world class companies doing business outside of their home country are going to outfit their manufacturing plants with equipment and processes that they already know and understand completely, and have one set of engineering resources in place to support. They just aren't going to spend additional engineering time and money to change a known process, no matter how seemingly small, just so that they can put some local resources and suppliers to work. Aside from higher cost, this also causes them to lose a measure of control because they are now vulnerable to the potential failure of at least twice as many process variations, and potential supplier failures, than they started with.

If you would like a larger example, look at a company like Intel. Everywhere that they build a high volume wafer fab plant in the world, they employ hundreds if not thousands of local people. But plant equipment? That's all coming straight from US companies: Applied Materials, KLA Tencor, FormFactor, Novellus, etc just to name a few, and in turn, the US suppliers that support those companies. Intel spends hundreds of millions of dollars in the simple pursuit of having every process be exactly the same and therefore, having a totally predictable process that performs as designed, every time. They can also move processes between facilities as their needs change, at a minimal cost. This flexibility is also what allows them to have quick changeover of their plants between designs as well.

Do you think that a company like Honda is not concerned with rapid changeover and manufacturing flexibility?

Don't get me wrong...there is plenty that I don't like about the way that foreign compaines are allowed to do business in the US. (All of my cars are American, also, by the way) But it's not realistic to expect ANY world class, large scale manufacturing company to do what you are saying. I'm not aware of any large scale manufacturing company (from ANY country) that is going to go into a foreign country, and significantly re-tool and change their known processes that they already know and understand, just to benefit the local economy. Sorry, it's just not going to happen.

I'm done. -Rob

[Fluid Power]

Great points Rob!

I understand your comments. Our government has a lot to do with the way these companies operate here and that is part of the issue. While I do not expect Honda to allow me to do business simply because I am here, it is just amazing how blatent nationalism overides basic engineering issues in some instances. In the few instances that the companies have looked to outside sources for engineering solutions, we have always been confined by using Japanese parts. While it makes sense from a supplier standardization issue, it amazes me when we develop a process with products far superior than what is offered by a Japanese company with proven engineering data. The last example was a cost savings of $800 per actuator with a life span 1.5x longer than the spec'd Japanese product. We built and cycled the machine in house and verified the results. The end result? They bought the machine with the Japanese parts!!!

The timing of the article and this project led to the post.

Business has been very good for me. So do not take my comments as frustrated business owner. We have adapted very well to the loss of automobile jobs and other manufacturing and have added other resources to serve the remaining business in the state.


Darren

[rwhite692]

Hi Darren, Thanks, You raise some good points as well. It certainly is a very tough and competetive marketplace, and not all decisions seem to make a lot of sense. I'm certainly glad we are seeing better and more appealing products coming from the domestic automakers. At the end of the day, good products are what it's all about if you want to keep, and grow any business. -Rob

not sure why their insistence on japanese parts is "racist" but for americans to use and swear by american parts is "patriotic".

[Fluid Power]

Let the records show that neither myself or Rob called the Japanese racist.

Darren

[californiacuda]

If the Japanese manufacturers only use Japanese subs, then that's racist. Same for American or any body else.

My main point is that it is in the best interest of any company to produce their best product for the cheapest price. An exclusion of a good resource for some prejudicial reason is counterproductive to good business practices.

In a competitive marketplace bad business practices can have negative results.

[p_call]

I am an engineer for a Tier I supplier (Stanley Electric) to Honda. I completely agree with what Darren said about the Japanese supporting their own economy. They are very loyal to their own companies. Every engineering group except mine buys Japanese supplied equipment. The only way we get away with it is all of our lines are complete custom applications that need to be built here.

Darren, send me a pm. I would like to find out more about your company, I'm always looking for potential sources.