Mexicana Wire WorksRon Garcia felt good about his first week as a managementtrainee at Mexicana Wire Winding, Inc. He had not yet developedany technical knowledge about the manufacturingprocess, but he had toured the entire facility, located in the suburbsof Mexico City, and had met many people in various areasof the operation.Mexicana, a subsidiary of Westover Wire Works, a Texasfirm, is a medium-sized producer of wire windings used in makingelectrical transformers. Carlos Alverez, the production controlmanager, described the windings to Garcia as being ofstandardized design. GarciaAc€?cs tour of the plant, laid out byprocess type (see Figure 7.20), followed the manufacturing sequencefor the windings: drawing, extrusion, winding, inspection,and packaging. After inspection, good product is packagedand sent to finished product storage; defective product is storedseparately until it can be reworked.On March 8, Vivian Espania, MexicanaAc€?cs general manager,stopped by GarciaAc€?cs office and asked him to attend a staff meetingat 1:00 P.M.Ac€A?LetAc€?cs get started with the business at hand,Ac€?? Vivian said,opening the meeting. Ac€A?You all have met Ron Garcia, our newmanagement trainee. Ron studied operations management in hisMBA program in southern California, so I think he is competentto help us with a problem we have been discussing for a longtime without resolution. IAc€?cm sure that each of you on my staffwill give Ron your full cooperation.Ac€??Vivian turned to JosAf© Arroyo, production control manager.Ac€A?JosAf©, why donAc€?ct you describe the problem we are facing?Ac€??Ac€A?Well,Ac€?? JosAf© said, Ac€A?business is very good right now. We arebooking more orders than we can fill. We will have some newequipment on line within the next several months, which willtake care of our capacity problems, but that wonAc€?ct help us inApril. I have located some retired employees who used to workin the drawing department, and I am planning to bring them inas temporary employees in April to increase capacity there.Because we are planning to refinance some of our long-termdebt, Vivian wants our profits to look as good as possible inApril. IAc€?cm having a hard time figuring out which orders to runand which to back order so that I can make the bottom line lookas good as possible. Can you help me with this?Ac€??Garcia was surprised and apprehensive to receive such animportant, high-profile assignment so early in his career.
Mexicana Wire Winding, Inc.
Questions1. What recommendations should Ron Garcia make, withwhat justification? Provide a detailed analysis with charts,graphs, and computer printouts included.
2. Discuss the need for temporary workers in the drawingdepartment.
3. Discuss the plant layout.
Source: Professor Victor E. Sower, Sam Houston State University. This casematerial is based on an actual situation, with names and data altered for confidentiality.