Micom Caribe

Micom Caribe Coming straight from the success story pages of the Silicon Valley, Micom Communication Corporation (MMC) based in California - 1973, was a pioneer in Data Communication equipments. Their products were targeted to reduce the communication cost, by connecting many different types of data and communication equipment using one "box" rather than a complex system. Micom Caribe, one of manufacturing facilities of MMC was established in Puerto Rico. Intended to produce only high-volume, stable products. Caribe proved itself to be more effective and more profitable, before taxes than the other manufacturing facilities of MMC based in United States, Mexico and Singapore. Caribe had the geographical location advantage of cheap labor, government support benefits and tax exemptions. Unlike other manufacturing facilities in Puerto Rico, Caribe was traditional, static and hierarchical - designed to support their ability to provide low cost over a stable range of products. Coordination and scheduling were carried out by "pushing" work onto the floor level. Quality systems relied on traditional techniques such as Acceptable Quality levels (AQL) and inspection. Later plant manager, Tom Moschetti lead Caribe towards the path of improving to become an efficient and effective organization. Making it more valuable for the specialized manufacturing of MMC. The employees at Caribe were single task oriented and were meant to do specialize in one single product range. All the directions and work specifications came in from California "Design facility", the operators had to follow the pre-tested manufacturing steps. It was in 1987, Quality problems had plagued the introduction of their highly marketed, the company's best ever "the Quality product" - Micom Box. The product was marketed in the right direction; the demand was acquired for it. However, the final product did not satisfy the customers. This led to the quality crash in 1987, making MMC's Carbie operations realize the need to understand the customer quality needs and standards. Micom Box not differed from the manufacturing Caribe had been accustomed to, it required certain quality, operations and quick response measures which Caribe was not practicing for their current operations. Caribe's geographical location did not support helping them deal with this crash, however it resulted in severe setback. Caribe was located very far from the head quarters. The lack of communication from Caribe with the design and marketing facilities caused delay in finding the root cause of the problem. Telephone communication was not the best means to pass on important regarding the design specifications and customer feedbacks. The cultural background of the operators was a considerable disadvantage; the workers were low skilled and single task oriented, from sugar cane makers they transformed to high tech part manufactures. The operators were trained in a manner to accept directions and orders from the design facilities, they had no involvement in the process. The Design engineers were not aware of the manufacturing