H.C. Starck Business Case

H.C. Starck Business Case

Why are the lead times so long?

There are many reasons to explain why the lead times at H.C. Starck, Inc. were so long. A variety of explanations can be made, in which all were mentioned by various members of the H.C. Starck, Inc. team or through inferences made by management.

To begin, H.C. Starck, Inc. experienced lead times that were longer than expected because there was a belief that the manufacturing time was taking far too long, although no hard data was provided to support this. Also, Lee Sallade, who was the director of Operations for H.C. Starck, Inc., believed that although focusing on lead time was important, focusing on it solely would be a significant error in all aspects. He felt that in addition to controlling lead time that overall cycle time needed to be accounted for, as well, which may have also led to the lead times lasting for such an extended period of time. Lee emphasized that cycle time and inventory were very important to the company, but both were very difficult to control since H.C. Starck, Inc. held such a significant amount of tantalum inventory. Lastly, Lee felt that managing data was crucial to success, and he was concerned that many of the operational decisions of the company were based on myths or “hear say” and that, “rigorous data collection and analysis could help to break out of this mode of operation.”

Another explanation as to why lead time may have been so long for H.C. Starck, Inc. stem from the fact that the company had Ta reduction and powder manufacturing operations in Japan, Thailand and Germany. However, the Newton, MA location in the United States was the only plant that possessed the melting and mill capabilities needed in order to fulfill customer orders. This meant that any orders that needed to be melted or passed through the mills needed to be sent from the locations overseas to the Newton, MA location, which in turn, would create bottlenecks for production and longer lead times for...