Samples

Ford VS Toyota

The current paper deals with the question of productive flow and product quality of the two biggest and the most famous car producers in the world, Ford and Toyota and in what way improvements in productive flow and product quality lead to an increase in sales and profit of the companies. Both of them are worldwide famous manufacturers of the cars of different sizes and modifications.

The main principles of the company are constant quality that is supplied by permanent quality control and improvement of the product line (Hales 2001, p.23). Toyota has been a foremost supplier of pioneering lift trucks for over 40 years already. According to latest data, the company has sold   over 1 million cars to thousands of pleased customers in over 200 countries all over the world. It gained extreme popularity in every country. In every stage of the company’s operation there is a complete devotion to quality and constant improvement of the product flow, as the experts working in the company realize that there two factors can lead to the direct increasing of sales and result in the augmented profits. The dedication to the quality has led to the company’s popularity and recognition all over the world. Toyota is 100% devoted to delivering brilliance from product expansion to after sales service. Product quality and productive flow were put in place from the start at the Toyota Industrial Equipment Manufacturing capability in Columbus, Indiana. Improvement of a product quality authorize the employees of Toyota company to make quality their first priority and demonstrate devotion of the company commitment to quality in every stage of the production process. Needless to say, that product quality is essential for every company as it is a pledge of successful future. The latest researches of the Toyota activity, conducted in 2009 demonstrated that the company has implemented the innovative techniques for the product quality assurance.  By the quality-improvement program, the company will use the so-called go and see for yourself method to reinforce the ability to carry out technological investigations for every case of supposed malfunction of the product and to follow through with correct actions.
 
First, in the territory of United States, the company tried to be able to carry out on-site examinations within 24 hours of reported incidents by modification its information-gathering capabilities. In addition, the engineers of the company will conduct direct Customer Quality Engineering activities. Moreover, the company is planning to open technical offices in some U.S. towns that will hand out to reinforce the consumer service functions of Toyota local sales companies. Toyota Company is planning to undertake related initiatives in other regions of the world, increasing the functions of its technical offices and opening new ones as essential to maintain a solid, local reply in each region (Liker 2004, p. 24). These innovations in the sphere of quality control that the company managed to carry out during the last five years of its existence in the market have resulted in the increasing of sales and general profit of the company. It is understood that people need qualitative first class products. This is possible to achieve due to the constant improvement and quality control of the manufactured products. The company will equip its vehicles with an extended range of functionality for finding out the problems automatically and for recording the mistakes electronically, as well as conducting other tasks. This functionality will be very useful in quickly evaluating technological problems and in punctually taking counteractive measures. The next important issue under consideration of the company Toyota is the productive flaw .The managerial of the company understands that in order to preserve the positions in the market and provide the consumers with the permanent inventions and new products, it should maintain its production flow to avoid the stagnation of the manufacturing (Naughton, Takayama and Sparks 2005, p. 27).  The company tries to keep the production flow active. It leads to constant updating of the company’s model range. As a result, keeping to the stable productive flow and introducing of the productive quality measures lead to the increase of sales and profits of the company, making its production one of the most popular and demanded all over the world. The managerial of Toyota is sure that the more inventory, product quality control and productive flaw they have on hand, the longer their product lead time and the easier it will be for the company to react to the unexpected change in the marketplace. Considering the balance sheet of the company for 2009, it has 18 to 20 % of increased sales and is now the second foremost carmaker in the whole world. The margins of the company are approximately 17%. One of Toyota's main philosophies is the idea of constant improving both in production flaw and in quality of the products (Migliorato 2004, p.40). Employees at company Toyota production facilities are always encouraged to present new suggestions to improve their processes, modernize operations and then demonstrate devotion to the overall quality of its products.

Another company under consideration is Ford Corporation. Probably, it is very difficult to find a person who does not know anything about this company. It has quite a long history making it world famous car manufacturer after Toyota and Crysler. Ford has production facilities in 22 countries on five continents in the world; it possesses 87 plants in North America and 41 in Europe. In 1995, in Europe, Ford's joint vehicle market share, at 12.2%, was the highest for the period of eleven years, with three of the eight best-selling vehicles. In 1995, Ford introduced as one of the leading and most popular vehicles in the country. It was one of the five vehicle producers (Banham 2002, p. 45). The company is not organized by geographic regions, and now it is realigned by product range, with five Vehicle Centers, every center is responsible for one group of products all over the world. The Company Ford, unlike Toyota, tries to spend as little time as possible for the development of new products, thus making the process of production flow very quick. Ford is reducing the time needed for development of new vehicle from 48 to 24 months and reducing engines, transmissions, and essential car platforms by 30% all over the world. The company hopes that pooling worldwide skills and resources will lead to more variations on every car platform, increasing the number of cars introduced during the next five years by 50%. It is the essence of the permanent productive flaw of the company. Ford has introduced a variety of new initiatives all over the world, with joint ventures for the assembly of cars in such countries as China, India, Thailand and Vietnam. In China, Ford tries to launch the production of light trucks with a name of a company Jiangling Motors. In India, Mahindra Ford India Ltd. will start producing and distributing of Ford products, starting with the Ford Escort, in mid-1996 and Fiesta in 1998.  Thailand is known as country where Ford has a joint venture to manufacture pick-up trucks (Ford 2004, p. 56).  Having the subsidiaries in different countries, the company tries to develop its productive flow. The more countries are engaged in the business of vehicles production of the company, the more vivid and permanent the productive flaw is. Needless to say, that such strategy leads to the increase of company’s sales and profits consequently. Probably, this is one of the key reasons of the company’s popularity and success in the market. One more important strategy for the company’s development is production quality and constant quality control. The managerial of the company pays particular attention to the control and testing of the manufactured vehicles. That is why, before entering to the market, the cars are properly tested. Ford is known by its qualified and secure products and such fame is possible to gain only due to constant and reliable job over the problem of product quality. Therefore, it explains high revenues of the company and increasing of its sales and profits. Company makes huge investments in the development of new ways of quality control and improvement of the quality of produced vehicles.

It is understood that in the competitive market of vehicle production quality is essential factor, presupposing company’s success. Managerial of the company should pay attention to these factors to be aware of the latest news in the market and develop the strategies that are necessary for company to be effective.

References

Banham, R. 2002, The Ford Century: Ford Motor Company and the Innovations that Shaped the World. New York: Artisan, p.43-46
Ford, H., 2004, My Life and Work, London: Public Domain Books, p. 50-60
Hales C. 2001, Managing Through Organization. 2nd ed. London: Thomson Learning Press  Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th Edition, 2010, p1-1, 1p

Liker, J. 2004, The Toyota Way. New York: McGraw-Hill, p. 22-25
Naughton, C., Takayama, H. and Sparks, D. Toyota Triumph. Newsweek (Atlantic Edition), 2005, Vol. 145 Issue 19, p44-49, 6p

Migliorato,P. Toyota Retools Japan, Business 2.0, 2004, Vol. 5 Issue 7, p39-41, 3p

 

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