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Q & A: design for manufacturingSMT Magazine, September 2003Q: What are the advantages of a Design for Manufacturing (DFM) environment and automating the process to ensure high-yield volume manufacturing? A: When implemented appropriately, DFM can make any company more competitive. By considering manufacturing issues during the design phase, significant issues can be resolved early, and key advantages realized. The most rewarding benefits include improved product development, a significant decrease in development time, and overall production costs. All of these factors will make you a much more competitive player in today's marketplace and accelerate time-to-market. Product development is a key influencing factor in the manufacturing process. In general, the product design can determine as much as 80 percent of the costs, as well as significantly impacting the quality, reliability and serviceability of products. By considering manufacturing issues during the design process, development time is decreased and the transition into manufacturing is much easier. Companies also can see improved assembly yields, a decrease in manufacturing rejects, and a reduction in engineering changes in the production phase. Today's most successful manufacturers recognize the urgency of getting quality products to market as quickly as possible, which can be extremely costly. However, in a DFM environment all phases of engineering are in close communication from the onset. Engent has provided DFM services for a number of NPI efforts, leading to a successful transition of products into volume manufacturing. The process of understanding these manufacturing issues has been made more robust through the use of software packages that incorporate these manufacturing rules into the analysis. To accomplish a robust DFM, tens of thousands, and in some cases hundreds of thousands of rule checks must be performed, a process that lends itself to software automation. The bugs are worked out early, and the transition from design to manufacturing can be simple and painless. Ramping up new projects and producing the necessary volumes quickly becomes a less risky undertaking in a DFM environment. Daniel F. Baldwin, Ph.D. is the president of Engent Inc., Norcross, Ga. Link to article on SMT Magazine For more information about Engent, Inc, please contact us at:
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