Shorter “Time to Volume” is the New Goal

We recently had a presentation by Bob Parker of Manufacturing Insights.

He described a new measure of product innovation and manufacturing:  time to volume.  This is considered a better measurement than ‘time to market’, as it captures the time period required to get a new product into volume production.  For instance, over half of the ECO’s (engineering change orders) are logged against a product during the first 90 days, as the product begins volume manufacturing.

Efforts to focus on reducing ‘time to market’ have been observed to cause engineering and product design efforts to shortcut steps needed to verify manufacturing scalability, which can actually increase ‘time to volume’.  Instead, by measuring the ‘time to volume’, the alignment of activities in the product innovation process is increased.

Further, carrying out an effective new product introduction process has become of increased importance, as the number of new products introduced in consumer packaged goods worldwide has increased from 15,000 in 1990 to 36,000 in 2006.

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