A Systems study on the manufacturing system of Unilever Philippines' personal care plant

• Main Authors: Li, Lindsey Darlene, Sy, Giza Eileene U.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2006
• Subjects: Unilever Philippines; Manufacturing processes > Philippines; Production engineering > Philippines; Production management > Philippines; Hygiene products > Philippines; Food processing plants > Philippines; Food processing by-products industry > Philippines; Engineering
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_bachelors/9397
• Institution: De La Salle University

The study focused on the manufacturing system of Unilever Philippines' Personal Care Plant, which manufactures popular consumer brands such as Sunsilk, Vaseline, Ponds, Creamsilk, and others. After appraising the plant's present system, and evaluating, it turned out that the most prevalent problem was that of the negative material variance that the plant has been experiencing. This led to the group's problem statement of: Unilever Philippine's Personal Care (PC) Plant has a material usage variance amounting to an actual loss of Php12.17 Million from October of 2004 to 2005 Analysis of the causes of material variance were presented and discussed in Chapter 5. It was identified that actual material variance led to three main factors: bulk adjustments (54%), rejects (22%) and wastes (18%). Although the study focused on solving actual material variance, solutions addressing system material variance were also presented. Alternative solutions were generated to address these specific problems and a proposed system was generated. For bulk adjustments, the group proposes a monthly calibration of the dosing machine. For bulk rejects, worker training and re-briefing and providing visual aids in the mixing area is proposed. Lastly, for wastes, the solution is to replace the Teflon diaphragm in the suction pump causing leftovers in the bestanks. Moreover, management has decided on which of group's generated alternative solutions is to be implement to address to the problem of system variance. These were: Reassign job functions for BPCS encoders, make new batch sheets with incorporated RM item codes, and provide BPCS manual to encoder for the problem on wrong and no encoding. In addition, assign a point person in the development to be in charge of BOM, make an amendment form, and implement a quarterly BOM review to address to the problem of not updated BOMs. Full implementation of the proposed solution is expected to reduce by a 79.50% in the total amount of actual material variance. Moreover, a minimum annual net savings of Php10.5 Million was computed with a net present value of Php42.88 Million in 5 years.