Make Oman your destination for manufacturing innovation! Would you like to increase your business competitiveness? Would you like to gain an insight into new methods of working, acquire additional knowledge of markets and discover new product developments? We can help you gain the competitive advantage your company needs. Join us at The Public Establishment for Industrial Estates’ (www.peie.om) 2006 Smart Manufacturing Conference, 23 – 24 January 2006 at the Muscat Inter-Continental Hotel, Muscat, Oman.To survive in today's marketplace, manufacturers must embrace new ideas and processes. Keeping that competitive edge requires constant growth and improvement. That's where PEIE’s Smart Manufacturing Conference comes in. This annual event is aimed at helping small- and medium-sized Gulf-based manufacturers become progressively more successful in their marketplace. Indeed, this is the networking-with-knowledge-transfer event par excellence of the first quarter of 2006.
Why You Need to Be There
PEIE’s Smart Manufacturing Conference brings together experts from industry to give attendees the most useful and up-to-date information available.
Industry professionals attend this event to:
o Network with those facing similar challenges
o Interact with industry professionals who can provide stories of success and failure
o Learn what options are available or will be available soon for their operations
o Take away knowledge they can use immediately to improve their process and product
You need to be there if you are a manufacturing professional involved in:
o Management
o Engineering
o Design
o Quality
o Maximizing resources
o Production improvement
o Operations
o Product development
o Marketing
o Manufacturing operations improvement
Conference Schedule
Conference Registration: 1:00pm – 7:00pm: 22 January, Muscat Inter-Continental Hotel, Jabrin Ballroom.
Day 1
Welcome Coffee 7:45am – 8:30am
8:30am: Opening Address – HE Maqbool bin Ali Sultan, Minister of Commerce & Industry & Chairman, PEIE
8:40am – 9:15am Keynote Address
Professor Mike Gregory (pictured above) Head of the Manufacturing and Management Division of the Engineering Department (www.eng.cam.ac.uk) & the Institute for Manufacturing, Cambridge University (www.ifm.eng.cam.ac.uk)
Manufacturers are facing a major challenge from dynamic markets, discerning customers and increased global competition; there is pressure for companies to become more agile, virtual, team-based and innovative. Indeed, to truly succeed, manufacturers need to grow beyond traditional methods and fundamentally change the way they do business. In this respect, Professor Gregory’s keynote address will embrace: developing people, leadership, strategy, globalisation, competitiveness, business efficiency, lean thinking and adding value. In brief, issues that will help lead the Gulf’s manufacturing sector into the future.
Coffee Break: 9:15am – 9:30am
Session #1: 9:30am – 10:30am - Design Driven Strategies: Increase Manufacturing Opportunities
Colum Menzies Lowe, NHS National Patient Safety Agency (www.npsa.nhs.uk) & Sunil Varughese, Brand Indigo LLC (www.brandchannel.com/features_profile.asp?pr_id=238)
Would you build a house today without an architect's plans? Then why would you consider manufacturing a product without a design driven strategy? Companies that are “in the know” are using design driven strategies to solve problems and get to market with fresh, innovative designs. Designs that touch emotional priorities of consumers yet are manufacturable and have proven benefits and fill a functional need. Designs on time. Designs that succeed.
This session will share insight on design driven manufacturing strategies. It’ll demonstrate how strategy with design as a priority creates platforms that in the end increase manufacturing opportunities. Most manufacturers know very little about how to use design to drive the manufacturing process. This session will change that.
Coffee Break: 10:30am – 10:45am
Session #2: 10:45am – 12:30pm - The Lean Enterprise
Mark Eaton, Director of Consultancy, Advance Projects Ltd (www.iee.org/oncomms/pn/manufacturing/biogs.cfm) & Mohammad Ajlouni, Managing Director, Jordan Specialized Vehicle Manufacturing Company.
Ever since the publication of The Machine that Changed the World in 1990, lean concepts have represented a powerful and influential set of management ideas. Originating from MIT-led research in the global automotive industry, lean principles represent an approach to managing operations that, properly applied, can yield unparalleled results in terms of efficiency and accuracy. The implementation of lean ideas thus promises enormous benefits in terms of productivity, quality and many other measures of operational performance. Lean implementations now stretch across many industry sectors and business processes. Lean initiatives have reduced in-process inventories, implemented cells and balanced takt times. The same Lean concepts of reducing waste and cycle time can be applied to the bureaucracy, manual paperwork and management procedures in the factory. By eliminating wasteful steps from the shop floor process management procedures, manufacturers can reduce the cycle time required to react and respond to unplanned events like machine downtime, part shortages, defects and critical engineering changes.
Lean process management procedures reduce the time required to respond to unplanned events from days to hours, from hours to minutes. The result is an even more agile factory. The reduction in cost of paperwork procedures and the reduction of buffer times will provide the next big leap in cycle time and productivity metrics.
In this session you’ll learn how to remove the various forms of waste from the information flow in complex discrete manufacturing and also learn how industry leaders are moving away from paper based processes on the shop floor.
Lunch: 12:30pm – 1:45pm
Session #3: 1:45pm – 3:15pm Innovation & Manufacturing
Professor Mike Gregory, Head of the Manufacturing and Management Division of the Engineering Department & the Institute for Manufacturing, Cambridge University, Dr. Tim Minshall, Institute of Manufacturing, Cambridge University(ifm.eng.cam.ac.uk/people/thwm100) & Adrian McCarthy, Oxford Brookes University.
Everyone knows the fable of Jack’s fast-growing beanstalk. It grew and grew as if by magic. Unfortunately, companies don’t have magic beans that can make profits grow overnight like Jack’s plant. However, innovative manufacturers have discovered a number of strategies that can, over time, provide a lift to a company’s top- and bottom-line performance. Manufacturers across the world are reconsidering their business models and employing tactics to gain a sustainable competitive advantage. Session 3 will explore innovative strategies that have helped large and small manufacturers achieve real and substantial growth.
Coffee Break: 3:15pm – 3:30pm
Session #4: 3:30pm - 6:00pm - Marketing for Manufacturers
Graham Porter, Sun Microsytems (www.ameinfo.com/70252.html), Jamal Al Asmi, RealityCG (www.realitycg.com), Pam McCarthy, Oxford Brookes University & Dr. S. Irfan Ahmad, Director, Yahoo! Middle East (www.strategiy.com/interview.asp?id=20050918071650)
This informative and insighful session will present marketing concepts and tips specifically geared toward manufacturers who need to know the fundamentals of New Marketing and Branding as a way of creating a strategic advantage.
In this high energy, high impact session, you’ll learn how to identify the “good money,” how to gain an advantage over your competition that has nothing to do with price, how to get on your buyer’s “short list,” how to use a little known secret of frequency to earn big dividends and how to hold your marketing department accountable for the budget. It’s a session that will help you improve your business situation and grow your revenue. In brief, this is the marketing session manufacturers need to attend!
Day 2
Welcome Coffee: 8:45am – 9:15am
Session #5: 9:15am – 11:00am China, the Gulf & the Realities of Global Competition
Dexter See, Vice-President, International Marketing, Ascendas Pte Ltd, Singapore (www.ascendas.com) & Professor Kulwant Pawar, Nottingham University Business School(www.nottingham.ac.uk/business).
China is careening down the path toward a market economy – with a long way to go, but with no turning back. To every manufacturer, China is both a threat and an opportunity. Over the next decade, nothing will be as important as China in defining corporate success or failure. How might manufacturers decide on what’s next - soft or hard landing or continued explosive growth? We interpret the key issues involving China – trade and legal reforms, WTO implementation, intellectual property, banking and finance, currencies, commodities, energy, FDI, infrastructure, the environment, privatization and the emerging greatest M&A boom in the history of the world. Where should China fit in to your global plans? What are the keys to manufacturing success in China?
Coffee Break: 11:00am – 11:15am
Session #6: 11:15am – 12:45pm - The Future of Manufacturing
S. Gopalan, Reem Batteries (www.reembatteries.com), Dr. Tim Minshall, Institute of Manufacturing, Cambridge University & Raza Ashraf, Total Alignment (www.peie.om/company_news_raza.asp), (www.apexstuff.com/bt/200511/column.asp)
Speed is increasing in every dimension of business and the ability to adapt rapidly to such changes will undoubtedly deliver significant competitive advantage. This session will examine how companies can leverage new technology innovations and transform them into new business opportunities from a variety of perspectives. Represented on this panel is a large Gulf-based manufacturer, a large consultancy company and a Cambridge University professor.
Lunch: 12:45pm – 2:00pm
Session #7: 2:00pm - 3:30pm - New & Emerging Technologies: Smart Machines
Antonio Briguglio, Sun Microsystems & Amrou Al Shareef, Seeb Systems. (www.kom.om/index96d9.html?lang=en& sub=tenant_directory&id=seeb_systems)
Technology is helping create a new class of machines that that can "think" and quickly produce parts to exact specifications, without unscheduled delays. This session will explore this technology and the type of Smart Machines that are being created, how they work and how they can save you time and money.
Concluding Remarks: 3:30pm.
Bonus Session: Lean Enterprise Workshop
9:30am - 1:00pm, 25 January 2006 - Knowledge Oasis Muscat
Mark Eaton, Director of Consultancy, Advance Projects Ltd
In addition to the two-day conference, attend a special, pan-sector, half-day Lean Enterprise Workshop. Many have tried to implement lean production in their businesses - some have succeeded, while many have struggled. Lean can be a key competitive advantage in all types of businesses, especially manufacturers, giving them shorter, more responsive production, more effective ‘office’ processes and higher productivity. This drive for ever better performance is a hard path to follow and sustain. This workshop does not promise magic recipes - instead it offers the chance to hear what it takes from those - big and small - who have lived through successful lean transformations. In particular, the workshop will highlight Lean case studies drawn from manufacturing, the armed forces and the health sector.
This Workshop is not just about listening - it will show you how to use the three key tools to start you on your lean journey. Learn to see the waste in the value streams in your organization, learn how to create continuous flow in your processes and learn how to improve customer service and cut costs by re-configuring your supply chains.
