|
by Stephanie Neil, MA Editorial Staff   Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. builds some of the fiercest fighter planes around, like the next-generation F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. The F-35 is described as a stealthy, supersonic tactical aircraft for the 21st century. And yet engineering the military craft of the future was actually the easy part. Making it in 20th century conditions was much harder. Lockheed Martin Aeronautics (LM Aero), a division of the $37 billion Lockheed Martin Corp., manufactures combat aircraft, airlifters, and surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft in seven U.S. production facilities. Its low-cost, innovative designs have helped it win many government contracts. But LM Aero is not immune to competitive pressure. So when the F-35 proposal was on the table back in 2000, the company had to win not only on design and quality, but also on an aggressive manufacturing schedule. Plans called for more than 3,000 F-35 aircraft to roll out over the life of the program. In order to deliver, LM Aero had to demonstrate it could produce the F-35 in half the time it took to make earlier-generation fighter planes. And that would require a big change in the company's infrastructure of custom-built legacy systems and production workflow, which had not been built for integration between processes. [Click to continue] |