Analysis of modern factory structures and their transformability

Abstract

This chapter offers a look at the automotive manufacturing processes in use today and how these processes may look in the near future. The focus is on the manufacturing process itself and its impact on the factory structure, beginning with equipment, which should be reconfigurable (see parts II, V of this book) in order to facilitate faster and more cost-effective car model changes, and continuing with the factory itself, which should posses a kind of transformability of its structure and layout. © 2006 Springer.