ROLLING MEADOWS, Ill.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The Association for Manufacturing Excellence is pleased to honor both Accuride Erie Operations and Accuride Rockford Operations with a 2015 AME Excellence Award. An AME representative will visit the Erie, Pa. facility to present the award on Sept. 18 and the Rockford, Ill., facility on Sept. 22. Both plants will also be honored during the AME 2015 International Conference, taking place Oct. 19-23, 2015 in Cincinnati, Ohio.
The AME Excellence Award recognizes North American manufacturing plants that have demonstrated excellence in manufacturing and business. The rigorous selection process begins when a company submits an extensive achievement report based on the AME Excellence Award evaluation criteria. For companies that score high enough during the achievement report review, an intensive site visit is completed, during which a volunteer team of manufacturing practitioners validates the submitted achievement report. Only a handful of applicants merit a site visit and approximately one third of the visits result in a site being recognized as an award recipient.
Accuride Henderson Operations in Kentucky received the AME Excellence Award in 2014.
“Accuride truly embodies what the AME Excellence Award stands for – achieving excellence throughout the enterprise,” said Barbara Morrison, AME president and CEO. “An achievement this big demonstrates that Accuride employees at all levels are engaged and committed to the lean journey,” added Morrison.
“Receiving three AME Excellence Awards in two years for our operations is a distinct honor for Accuride that demonstrates our ability to install and operate lean systems at multiple sites across our enterprise,” said Rick Dauch, Accuride president and CEO. “Our plants receiving awards this year have their origins in the 1800s and are represented by the United Auto Workers (UAW). This demonstrates union-represented facilities’ ability to embrace lean and make themselves competitive in North America through a combination of strong and disciplined management, capable union leadership, a dedicated workforce, effective suppliers and multi-year investments in industry-leading process capability and product technology.”
During their evaluation, the AME assessment team highlighted Accuride Erie Operations’ continuous improvement philosophy, observing management driving a culture of metrics-based performance to satisfy customer needs. The assessors also praised the facility’s standout strengths of detailed level planning of plan-for-every-part (PFEP), well-organized product development data and their strong focus on material flow improvements utilizing value stream mapping, visual kanban pull processes and more.
The AME assessment team noted, “One of the most impressive aspects of the site visit was the obvious and visible cooperation with the UAW union. Union leadership clearly respects management and supports the continuous improvement effort. It was obvious there is a great deal of goal sharing, collaboration and respect.”
During the Accuride Rockford Operations site visit, the AME assessment team highlighted the plant’s standout strengths, which included the application of visual scheduling boards resulting in the launch of fourth-generation production pull boards and the use of value stream mapping in the factory and for office processes. The assessment team praised the Rockford facility’s corporate and factory hoshin kanri, and the execution program tied to the associate incentive/bonus program. The assessment team also commended the Rockford facility’s partnership with a perishable tooling supplier and effort to use 100 percent of tool life.
“Rockford leadership can be proud of the site’s accomplishments, particularly the transformation of major areas in the physical plant. The transformation from working conditions that could be considered very extreme to that of relative comfort is remarkable,” stated the assessment team report. “The Gunite Rockford facility has excellent plant leadership and support from corporate that is resulting in a continuous improvement system, using automation combined with lean and six sigma tools.”
Accuride Rockford Operations manufactures Gunite® brand brake drums, slack adjusters and other wheel-end components for the North American commercial vehicle industry. Along with its focus on innovative product design, development and manufacturing, Rockford Operations continues to emphasize quality and dependable performance for customers.
Accuride Erie Operations is one of two Accuride plants in the United States dedicated solely to the manufacturing of forged aluminium wheels for the North American commercial vehicle industry. Erie Operations contains forge presses and advanced heat treat technology, coupled with best-in-class automated aluminium wheel machining and polishing technology.
About Accuride Corporation
With headquarters in Evansville, Ind., USA, Accuride Corporation is a leading supplier of components to the North American commercial vehicle industry. The company’s products include commercial vehicle wheels; wheel-end components and assemblies; and specialty cast-iron components for a range of agricultural, construction and mining, and oil and gas equipment applications. The company’s products are marketed under its brand names, which include Accuride®, Accuride Wheel End SolutionsTM, Gunite®, and BrillionTM. Accuride’s common stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol ACW. For more information, visit the company’s website at www.accuridecorp.com.
About the Association for Manufacturing Excellence
The Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME) is the premier not-for-profit organization dedicated to the journey of continuous improvement and enterprise excellence. AME’s membership is composed of a trusted network of volunteers who are committed to leveraging the practitioner-to-practitioner and company-to-company shared-learning experience. Through engaging workshops, plant tours, webinars, summits and industry-leading conferences, AME members are continually discovering and implementing new continuous improvement strategies and best practices. AME offers its members a multitude of valuable resources to help them stay abreast of current industry developments and improve the skills, competitiveness and overall success of their organizations. Join AME in leading the “renaissance of manufacturing in North America." For more information, visit www.ame.org or email info@ame.org.
