The QIANG Way Forward

Stream Peak International, the largest desiccant converter in Singapore, is one of the organisations that has benefited from the "SME Quality Initiatives to Assist, Nurture and Grow" (SME QIANG) programme SME QIANG is a new customised productivity and innovation training programme under Productivity Initiatives in Services & Manufacturing (PRISM) which is a cluster of productivity-related Continuing Education and Training programmes .

Mr Jeffrey Foo, General Manager of Stream Peak International shared, “At first it was difficult to identify the areas for improvement. But after a few workshops with the Singapore Manufacturers’ Federation consultants , where we did project scoping and data collection together, we realised that the underlying problem was two under-utilised high performing machines that we had.“

Implementing New Tools Of The Trade

From daily dealings with machine tools, the general manager of Makino Asia, Simon Yim, took to productivity tools at the workplace for a change. It was a change that was met with marked success.

Makino Asia is a global machine tools manufacturer with fully integrated operations in Singapore, encompassing Research and Development, Manufacturing, Supply Chain Management and Business Development activities under one roof. So, it was of concern when Simon Yim and his team discovered discrepancies between the company’s assembly elapsed hours and the standard hours. He also noticed that at the middle management level, there was a need to improve the knowledge and skills needed to understand, analyse and implement initiatives to improve productivity and quality.