Penske could sell 15,000 more smarts

[dancote]

If Roger Penske could get 15,000 more cars, he could sell them. So says the latest issue of Winding Road
that includes a link to this article in Autoweek.

[MicroNut]

Nice article with some good, hard numbers.

The thing I found interesting is that the main production facility may not be the limiting factor as far as capcity goes, rather it is the parts suppliers. I know that smartville is in fact a campus that include not just the factory, but smaller units for every last parts supplier. This model is supposed to be very efficient in terms of delivering the necessary parts just in time, but it seems it can limit the flexibility in adjusting overall production rates to meet demand.

[spdickey]

Actually its very flexible. Problem is the factory is now going full tilt to meet demand not only in the USA, but worldwide.

The factory can turn up or down the "cadence" or how fast the cars go through the line. Apparently the drummers are banging the beat pretty fast right now in smartville.