Just-in-time (JIT) manufacturing is a strategy that aims to reduce inventory costs and improve operational efficiency by producing goods only as they are needed. In just-in-time production, products are created to meet demand, rather than being made in advance and held in surplus.
Just-in-time systems evolved as a management philosophy in Japan in the 1970s and were developed in Toyota car manufacturing plants by Taiichi Ochno. At that time, the company faced many challenges, such as lack of cash flow, lack of resources, lack of land, and excess labor. The Toyota Production System was created to conserve resources, minimize waste, and foster consistency. This system was so successful in its goals that it inspired companies around the world to develop their own just-in-time production techniques and methodologies.
Just-in-time scheduling is an approach within the wider just-in-time manufacturing methodology. It refers to how a manufacturer ensures that an order is produced with just the right amount of time to deliver on time. Doing so ensures that resources and materials don’t stack up unnecessarily and create waste. Just-in-time scheduling helps manufacturing companies cut warehousing and material costs and enhance productivity when it is required. Today this process is made possible by just-in-time scheduling software, which enables companies to manage their just-in-time inventory and schedule.
Just-in-time manufacturing lets you go from a make to sell to a sell then make process model. If a manufacturing business has predictable orders, it minimizes input levels by only provisioning what’s needed for sales and production when they’re needed. Just-in-time production reduces the inefficiency and cost of holding large amounts of inventory.
It’s a way of forecasting material usage, inventory, and productivity that has changed many practices associated with traditional manufacturing that waste resources.
The just-in-time system can also reveal motion waste, which is excessive movement of workers or inventory on the factory floor. It can reduce transport waste by stacking outgoing orders instead of maintaining transport fleets in constant cycles with half-full trucks.
Just-in-time manufacturing differs somewhat from lean manufacturing. Although both methodologies prioritize eliminating waste and improving efficiency, lean manufacturing focuses on practices across the entire business, incorporating everything from marketing and customer-service performance to aftermarket customer relationship management.
Just-in-time production, on the other hand, focuses on the process of manufacturing itself. It often includes connected elements, like partners and workers on the factory floor, but is mainly concerned with making products efficiently.
Autodesk offers an efficient and innovative solution for just-in-time inventory management: Fusion Operations.
Optimize stock
This just-in-time inventory management software helps you prevent overstocking and maintain optimal stock levels, as well as helping you organize your stock efficiently.
Automate processes
The Fusion Operations just-in-time inventory system allows you to automate and help streamline your processes and scale your operations.
Find out more about Fusion Operations’ just-in-time software, or start a free trial today to see for yourself.
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Businesses can be more nimble and responsive to customer needs by using just-in-time scheduling to rearrange the steps in the manufacturing process.
Turning production around faster means reducing warehousing or storage costs for stock, parts, or materials.
The barrier to entry for a new factory or new process is easier, due to lower investments in equipment, warehousing, and staff.
Just-in-time production reduces the time between receiving and fulfilling an order, making it responsive to customer needs and market changes.
Holding large amounts of production inputs in storage risks damage or obsolescence, which is waste that compounds warehousing costs. Just-in-time scheduling ensures that things are only produced when they are needed.
Staff are trained to be responsive and ready to pivot between duties. This creates a multiskilled workforce with higher overall job satisfaction.
In just-in-time manufacturing, seven types of waste are minimized to ensure efficiency, including:
Because transporting something usually doesn’t add value to the customer, it should be reduced wherever possible.
The movement of people and machines in the JIT manufacturing environment should only take place when necessary.
Excess inventory causes waste in the form of tied-up capital, wasted transport, and wasted storage capacity. Autodesk’s just-in-time inventory software, Fusion Operations, can help.
Overproduction leads to wasted materials, storage space, and capital. It may even lead to the product being disposed of. Lean production and just-in-time manufacturing help prevent this.
Just-in-time production dictates that you only need to deliver the level of value needed by the customer. Anything extra can be deemed as waste.
Products with defects can cause wasted time, money, and other resources, as well as potentially harm the company’s reputation.
Waiting by staff or machinery can be counted as waste because employees must be paid while waiting, and materials may expire during the wait. Just-in-time scheduling seeks to reduce wait times wherever possible.
Termobrasa
Just-in-time scheduling software gave water heater and pump supplier Termobrasa a new model to adapt to shifting workflows during the pandemic.
Image courtesy of Termobrasa
BAM Ireland
To refurbish a courthouse complex in Cork, BAM Ireland started with the delivery date and used just-in-time production planning to compress the project to meet the deadline.
Courtesy of BAM Ireland
IG Masonry Support Ltd
A UK-based company streamlined its operations and reduced errors through digitalization. This digital transformation turned IG Masonry Support's bespoke products into a strategic advantage.
Fusion Manage is Autodesk’s cloud-based solution that brings people, skills, processes, and data together in a single hub, helping businesses streamline their work and apply just-in-time principles using scheduling software.
Autodesk Fusion Operations is a manufacturing execution system (MES) that reports on every aspect of production in real time, visible through user-friendly interfaces on mobile devices. This helps plant managers find and exploit the efficiencies that can enable a truly just-in-time workflow.
Learn how JIT production scheduling tools can help manufacturers adapt to changing situations and identify high-quality production schedules.
Whenever hungry customers use the drive-through of a popular fast food, they’re experiencing just-in-time production.
The restaurant keeps only the inventory inputs revealed by order histories (thawing more patties and slicing more salad vegetables around lunchtime, for instance). Staff only puts them into production (by cooking and assembling food) when the order is received at the window.
Just-in-time manufacturing is a process that helps streamline the manufacturing function by eliminating waste and improving efficiency in inventory warehousing, equipment use, factory layout, staffing, and production times.
Lean manufacturing also addresses efficiency, but it covers the whole customer-order function, applying similar improvements across the business, from marketing and sales to aftermarket customer service.
Traditional manufacturing collects and assembles all the elements it will need to operate—from staff and inventory to workstations in the production line—for any anticipated influx of orders to ensure it can meet demand.
A just-in-time manufacturing process helps streamline the provision the provision of those elements, enlisting their use at a time that’s as late as possible in the production process but can still fulfill customer needs, minimizing downtime or waste of resources.
The most significant risk of just-in-time manufacturing is that the business may not have enough resources to fulfill customer needs if there is a spike in orders or an unexpected shift in market conditions.
Late-as-possible provisions can also increase prices from suppliers. Because supply can be interrupted by many factors—including pandemics, weather, or geopolitics—fewer resources may be available, with less room to innovate or experiment.
