Donner Company

Current Situation:
Donner Company was founded in 1985. The company produces circuit boards for several
electronics manufacturers. Donner’s top management team is consists of engineers who have an
extensive experience in electronics manufacturing. By the end of 1987, the company was facing
a fierce competition from 750 printed circuit manufacturers in the United States. The increase in
the number of circuit boards manufacturers was due to the growth in the industry of electronics.
Although the company was successful, Donner suffered from several operational problems that
influenced the company negatively. The management felt that they should review the company’s
current position to improve and plan for next year’s operations.

Analysis:
Process Flow:

The process flow in Donner Company consists of three stages: preparation, image transfer and
fabrication, this method is known as “ Soldermask Over Bare Copper.” Each of these stages
have its own steps. The first stage is preparation. In this stage Donner Company receives an
artwork from customers; This is used to develop a negative image. After that the size of the
panel and the image repeat rate is determined. Next, the laminate will be inspected to be certain
that it has zero defects and it will be sheared into 12X18 panels. The final step in this stage is to
determine the hole locations where the panel will be punched. The second stage is image
printing. In this stage the company uses CNC to drills holes in the panel then it goes through a
process called metallization which is basically a copper immersion bath. After that the panels
will be cleaned by washing them with dry film photoresist. Next, the DFPR will be removed
from the artwork and exposed to UV light. Finally the DFPR will be chemically striped and it
goes to a process called etching process.
The final stage is fabrication. The first step in this stage is processing the panels with solder
mask silkscreen. Then panels will be dipped into a solder bath. After that the panels will be
modified into their finished shape. Finally a visual inspection will be conducted on panels and
they also will be, electronically tested, packaged, and shipped.

All Stages Flow Chart:

Preparation Stage Flow Chart:

Image Printing Stage Flow Chart:

Fabrication Stage Flow Chart:
Order Size:
If the order size is 200, either option will work as that is the point where the cost will be equal
for both options. That said if the order size is less than 200, the drill will be the preferred option
because it will take less time which means a lower cost. On the other hand if the order size is
more than 200, the router will be best because it will take less time and a lower cost will be
incurred.
50 minutes + 1 *200 = 150 minutes + (0.5)+ 200
250 = 250
200 = break even.

DFPR Capacity:

(8 boards * 60)/47.4= 10.126

10 Orders per day
The capacity of the Dry Film Photoresist area is 10 orders per day (assuming the order size is
eight), Capacity has a negative relationship with order size. if there is an increase in order size,
the capacity for the day will decrease. That said there a positive relationship when it comes to
the size of an order and the capacity of boards for the day.

When there is 1 board, Donner will use the manual drill as it is both time and cost effective. This
results in a standard labor time of about 6.39 hrs. When there is eight boards Donner will use the
drill and it will be 10.25 hours. Lastly when there is 200, the break-even point, either tool can be
used which will result in a time of 30.67 hours.

Recommendations:

The three-year recent Donner Company has positioned itself well inside each the tiny volume,
modified computer circuit boards market similarly because the massive volume, generic
(captive) computer circuit boards market.
Large electronic companies created their elements in captive retailers, whereas smaller sized
corporations, or once giant and little quantities of straightforward technology or quick turn-
around model boards were needed, these requests sometimes square measure consummated by
contract retailers. With 750 competitors within the USA alone, and a market that's volatile,
Donner’s ability to anticipate and resolve style issues and model techniques enabled it to keep up
its competitive edge. However, this competitive edge has been compromised by poor on-time
delivery and high rate of product come back, additionally to coming up with and producing
issues that caused bottlenecks, shifting bottlenecks and improper utilization of labor. These
issues began to hamper the performance of the firm, and management started evaluating the
company’s position and totally different strategic policies.
Trace an order as it moves from the originating customers to completion:
STEPS: 1. Plummer, President and Altmeyer, Design Engineer projected labor and material cost
in organizing a bid for customer order.
2. If the customer receive the bid, deliver in three weeks for order of less than 1000 boards and
five weeks for better than 1000 boards.
3. Arrange detailed material specifications and factory order showing material specifications,
distribution date, no of circuits and arrangement of operations.
4. Sent the order details to acquisition agent for acquiring raw materials at low price in about 4
days for usual order and just a day for rush orders
5. Enter the order in log and send a blueprint and factor order to supervisor.
6. Schedule the order based on approximation of labor, raw materials, worker shift and other
serious desires.

Specific actions recommended to Plummer take to address these problems:

1) The Plate worked at a table inspecting panel was unbroken 18” removed from plating tanks.
Altmeyer found that V-J Day of the time was spent walking between the table and therefore the
tanks. That the skilled worker are often placed nearer to Plating tank in order that the walking
time are often reduced.
2) Assign the staff into varied method betting on the character of the task. This action can build
the processes to be meted out during an additional organized manner and forestall the wastage of
your time by moving from one job task to a different. The method becomes additional of}
economical and therefore saves lot of your time in average work flow.
3) Employ a separate team to deal with phone calls from the customer’s engineers UN agency
had encountered style issues. Either use them from the prevailing pool of workers or
hire/contract new workers. Since one fourth of the roles got delayed as a result of phone calls,
this could facilitate in reducing job delay and additionally improve the productivity of workers
UN agency area unit handling operations job as they will concentrate completely on production
method.