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Operations Management
Honda:
Honda Motor Company, Ltd is a Japanese multinational corporation
primarily known as a manufacturer of automobiles and motorcycles.
Honda is the world's largest manufacturer of motorcycles as well as the
world's largest manufacturer of internal combustion engines measured
by volume, producing more than 14 million internal combustion
engines each year. Honda surpassed Nissan in 2001 to become the
second-largest Japanese automobile manufacturer. As of August 2008,
Honda surpassed Chrysler as the fourth largest automobile
manufacturer in the United States. Honda is the sixth largest
automobile manufacturer in the world.

Honda was the first Japanese automobile manufacturer to release a

dedicated luxury brand, Acura in 1986. Aside from their core
automobile and motorcycle businesses, Honda also manufactures
garden equipment, marine engines, personal watercraft and power
generators, amongst others. Since 1986, Honda has been involved with
artificial intelligence/robotics research and released their ASIMO robot
in 2000. They have also ventured into aerospace with the
establishment of GE Honda Aero Engines in 2004 and the Honda HA-
420 HondaJet, scheduled to be released in 2011. Honda spends about
5% of its revenues into R&D From a young age, Honda's founder,
Soichiro Honda had a great interest in automobiles. The first drafts of
his design were rejected, and Soichiro worked painstakingly to perfect
the design,
even going back to school and pawning his wife's jewelry for collateral.
Eventually, he won a
contract with Toyota and built a factory to construct pistons for them,
which was destroyed in an
earthquake. Due to a gas shortage during World War II, Honda was
unable to use his car, and his
novel idea of attaching a small engine to his bicycle attracted much
curiosity. He then established
the Honda Technical Research Institute in Hamamatsu, Japan, to
develop and produce small 2-
cycle motorbike engines. Calling upon 18,000 bicycle shop owners
across Japan to take part in
revitalizing a nation torn apart by war, Soichiro received enough
capital to engineer his first
motorcycle, the Honda Cub. This marked the beginning of Honda
Motor Company, who would
grow a short time later to be the world's largest manufacturer of
motorcycles by 1964.
Honda in U.A.E:
Established in 1971, Trading Enterprises owns the sole distribution
rights for Honda vehicles,
motorcycles, marine engines, power products and parts as well as
Volvo, Chrysler, Jeep and
Dodge vehicles.
Competing in the UAE's Japanese, American and European automotive
marketplace, the
company is supported by a network of modern showrooms, workshops
and parts outlets across
the UAE, with sales and after-sales operations existing in all seven
emirates.
In 1977, Trading Enterprises was awarded the official distributorship
rights for Honda in the
UAE. Since those early days, sales of the Honda premium range of
technically advanced car

Quality:

The business meanings ofquality have developed over time. Various

interpretations are given below:
1.ISO 9000: "Degree to which a set of inherent characteristics fulfills
requirements”. The standard definesrequirement as need or
expectation.
2.Six Sigma: "Number of defects per million opportunities."
Improved productivity is a source of greater revenues, employment
opportunities and
technological advances. However, this has not been the case
historically, and in the early 19th
century it was recognized that some markets, such as those in Asia,
preferred cheaper products to
those of quality. Most discussions of quality refer to a finished part,
wherever it is in the process

Inspection, which is what, quality insurance usually means, is

historical, since the work is done.
The best way to think about quality is in process control. If the process
is under control,
inspection is not necessary.
Many different techniques and concepts have evolved to improve
product or service quality:
•
Quality assurance: Prevention of defects, such as by the deployment of
a quality
management system and preventative activities like FMEA.
•
Quality control: Detection of defects, most commonly associated with
testing which takes
place within a quality management system typically referred to as
verification and
validation.
•
Quality management is focused not only on product quality, but also
the means to
achieve it. Quality management therefore uses quality assurance and
control of processes
as well as products to achieve more consistent quality..
•
Just in time (JIT): Just-in-time (JIT) is an inventory strategy that strives
to improve a
business's return on investment by reducing in-process inventory and
associated carrying
costs.
•
Total Quality Management: Also referred to as TQM. It is a philosophy
that embraces all
activities through which the needs and expectations of the customer
(both internal and
external) and the community, and the objectives of the organization,
are satisfied in the
most efficient and cost-effective way possible by maximizing the
potential of all
employees in a continuous drive for improvement.
•
Quality Circles: Teams that follow a standard process of problem
identification, root
cause analysis, problem solving and implementation. In Japanese firms
there is a greater
focus on statistical quality control, employees mee

Quality techniques in Honda:

•Quality enhancement: Honda considers the ongoing challenge of
quality enhancement to
be of the highest priority. We’re working on it on a daily basis, seeking
to enhance
customer satisfaction with respect to all of our products and services.
•
Quality assurance: Honda has established Quality Innovation Centers
worldwide to
prevent avoidable product quality issues from arising and to enhance
our capacity to
swiftly resolve difficulties whenever they arise. Specialized service
departments at these
centers are equipped to handle cases referred to them by local
dealerships. They provide
timely diagnosis and resolution of any quality issues, and keep
customers and technicians
fully up to speed by disseminating the latest updates on recommended
maintenance
procedures. By carefully documenting issues and solutions, then
sharing them with the
rest of the organization, our dedicated associates are working both to
resolve issues and
prevent them from recurring.
•
Promoting quality worldwide: Honda facilities around the world are
certified under ISO quality assurance and environmental management
systems standards, and special product quality assurance systems
have been developed and implemented in many local markets.
Since Honda manufactures products and procures both parts and
materials in many different countries, however, a global quality
assurance system is required. To that end, we are currently
implementing the Global Honda Quality Standard, or G-HQS, with a
view to simultaneously ensuring the quality of every single Honda
product, regardless of where it is purchased. Under the direction of top
management, our facilities around the world are working constantly to
harmonize both their products and their services to this global
standard, taking care to prevent any recurrence of known issues and to
deliver to the customer products of the highest possible quality

Protecting personal information: Honda has always regarded

customers’ personal information as important and private, and has
taken appropriate measures to protect that privacy. In view of the new
Personal Information
Protection Act enacted in Japan on April 1, 2005, Honda has instituted
new measures that are even more comprehensive and rigorous. We
have organized training seminars and distributed communications aids
to dealerships to ensure that every member of the Honda team in
Japan handles this important issue with due diligence and care.
Quality Control: In Japan, Honda offers three different quality control
courses, each focusing on a specific skill set. Since 1971, Honda Basic
Courses (HBC) have provided quality education not only to Honda
associates, but also to trainees sent to us by suppliers, thereby helping
cultivate new leaders in quality manufacturing.
Honda, as the other Japanese automotive companies, do not use the
same methods as used by the US firms (i.e.ISO/TS 16949:2002, PPAP,
APQP, FMEA, SPC and MSA). The do however spend a lot of up front
planning time and involve their suppliers to try to ensure that things
are designed well and to the customer wants and needs long before a
vehicle is ever produced. So, they are much more into quality
assurance versus tradition quality control which involves more
inspections of products. Honda still does a fair amount of inspection
and testing, however, it is done by the people actually doing the work
(workers check their own work) and thing like process behavior studies
are done to ensure that manufacturing processes are stable