Basingstoke: MAS helps business with £100k saving
A leading prosthetics manufacturer has cut product development time by 50% and saved over £100,000 in waste materials thanks to innovative training delivered by the Manufacturing Advisory Service (MAS) South East.
Chas A Blatchford & Sons, based in Basingstoke, manufactures the world-leading ENDOLITE range of artificial limb components but needed to speed up the time it was taking to get new products to market.
MAS South East specialist Chris Needham arranged for the company to be trained in the use of a Quality Function Deployment (QFD) tool. The QFD tool is a method for improving processes by looking at customer requirements and understanding best how to meet those requirements, particularly through product design.
Saeed Zahedi, technical director at Chas A Blatchford, said: “We contacted MAS South East once we knew we had new product issues - QFD was a solution and a tool we agreed to try but had insufficient resources to implement the training ourselves.
“MAS South East gave us direct access to QFD training and as a result we are now able to reduce our new product to market time from 18 months to 12 months with reduction in scrap material totalling over £100K in the next 24 months.”
Blatchford is now using the tool to improve both manufacturing processes and working patterns, enabling the company to deliver new products to market, on time and within budget.
