Auto Manufacturers Could Use Some BOMs

Next up this week, an investigation into car manufacturing and the place of BOMs is in order. To begin, since cars became widely accessible consumer products, car manufacturers have had to manage thousands of individual parts for assembly. Over 100 years later, and the number of parts in modern cars exceeds 30,000.

This trend is compounded by the fact that machines largely dominate automotive manufacture and assembly today. Moreover, while more efficient, these machines require routine maintenance check-ups and replacement to keep production quotas fulfilled. Therefore, constructing maintenance BOMs in this situation is a no-brainer. Most of these machines require expensive and specific components to function properly. By using BOMs to make this process more visible, users can minimize the risk of improper spare parts orders and a lack of visibility in factory inventory.

A Globalized Network of Component Sources

While this isn’t specific to the car industry, car manufacturers in North America are particularly pressed in coordinating between parts suppliers and assembly plants. That 30,000 estimate for parts needed to assemble a car doesn’t all come from the same region or country. Car manufacturers like Ford, GM, and Toyota regularly source individual parts from 20-30 countries per model. For instance, one warehouse might import speedometers from Germany, car seats from Mexico, or airbags from Japan. The industry has been globalizing for decades up until now, so it’s more critical than ever to coordinate where all these parts come from.

Therefore, building construction and maintenance BOMs is going to be a useful endeavor. Why? Well, even if they’ve finalized where their parts are sourced, communication between warehouses, factories, and retail stores is a must to make these networks sustainable long-term. Whenever a recall is announced from faulty brakes, or a new model needs a larger navigation display, or a warehouse has miscounted their available inventory, this coordination via a standardized bill of materials will make such changes easier to implement.