Strategic Alliances: Keeping your projects and partners in line
As OEM's depend more on moldmakers and injection molders for assistance with new-product development, these suppliers must be more engineering-savvy.  Often, that means farming out parts of a job to specialty contractors.
    Such a strategy requires good project management skills to ensure that all parties are on the same page and that consistent quality is maintained.  In recent surveys performed by several moldmakers and molders, "more project management" or "expanded project management" expertise was rated as one of the top needs of OEMs from their suppliers.

The Leader Of The Pack
    This is the situation in which moldmaker and molder Polymer Conversions, Inc. (Buffalo, NY) found itself.  With a customer base that is engineering-intensive, PCI had to develop its own engineering expertise, including a project management team.
    Heading up this team at PCI is the project manager, who's responsible for making sure that product development, mold design and engineering, and preproduction mold trials happen on schedule and without a hitch.  The project manager also acts as the contact point with the customer.
    "The project manager is really the captain that guides the boat through all the lock systems and waterways, which might be the various departments," explains Norb Schwab, PCI's engineering manager.
    The success of PCI's growth resides in the company's strong project management skills.  "We've built our company on people who have strong backgrounds in the industry," Schwab explains.  "We've developed QS and ISO procedures, which makes it easier for project management to pursue new work."

Strategic Partnerships
    Although the company has a strong engineering department, developing strategic partnerships has given PCI an edge in meeting customer requirements without the added expense of a larger staff.
    The company has aligned itself with Northern Design, a local design house, and is part of a Moldflow consortium at Penn State University, which performs flow analysis as part of student projects.  PCI also has partnered with some smaller, local mold shops.
    PCI starts a new program with a quality plan to establish time lines and milestones.  This review identifies outside vendor involvement and assigns departmental responsibility for overseeing each vendor.  Assisting this effort are PCI's Mold Standards.  Schwab says that when PCI subcontracts work to Northern Design, it already knows PCI's expectations for mold construction.  For complex jobs, Northern also attends the design meeting.

Notes Of Caution
    When partnering with outside vendors, caution must be exercised.  Partners should have  a similar corporate culture and the same commitment to quality and on-time delvery, notes Schwab.
    Also, some moldmakers and molders are reluctant to partner with other shops for fear the shop will go directly to the OEM for the work.  However, with the increasingly tough demands of OEM's, smaller shops often don't have an opportunity to get work from larger companies.
    "Mom-and-pop shops can't offer what we can in the way of being able to manage large programs," says Schwab.  "They're glad to partner with us because it allows them to build their business and do work for companies through us that they wouldn't have gotten on their own."
    Ultimately, Schwab believes that one of the greatest strengths for a molder today, even for a company of PCI's size, is engineering.  "You have to have strong engineering capabilitites, identifying parts as truly moldable, and understand CAD/CAM systems," he says.  "You've got to be able to manage programs, help the customers identify what they want, and determine the optimum way to get them there." ---Clare Goldsberry, Injection Molding Magazine, December 1999