Nissan Revs Up Its First Full-Size Vehicles with New Plant

CANTON, Miss.--March 2, 2005--With the most productive automotive plant in North America for the last eight out of nine years according to The Harbour Report, Nissan North America, Inc., knows how to drive manufacturing. The team has developed the "Nissan Production Way" - which has set the standard for many other manufacturers, including those well beyond the automotive industry. And, when it came time to launch the company's first line of full-size vehicles, Nissan looked to follow its proven and successful model at its award-winning plant in Smyrna, Tennessee - which includes cell-, machine- and plant-wide automation from GE Fanuc Automation, a unit of GE Infrastructure - at a new plant in Canton, Mississippi.

Today, Nissan's assembly plant in Canton covers 3.5 million square feet, represents an investment of $1.4 billion, and is designed to produce 400,000 vehicles per year at full capacity. With strong demand for Nissan products in North America, the team at the plant is using proven automation technology to put the pedal to the metal in Canton's production - monitoring and controlling processes from the highly flexible paint shop and carefully tracked production to environmentally friendly incineration and cost-effective energy management.

With the system in place, Nissan has been able to increase line speeds, handle varying model mixes, and decrease equipment downtime. The team has achieved the following results:

-- Meeting daily manufacturing achievement numbers and keeping production fluid;

-- Ensuring system quality and uptime that is approaching Six Sigma;

-- Excelling at implementation and production with an expert engineering team that is 25% of the size of competitors' engineering resources;

-- Decreasing training time by 70% on maintenance alone;

-- Reducing engineering training time at least 50%;

-- Reducing scrap for improved environmental friendliness;

-- Meeting tight environmental and safety standards for automotive manufacturing and documentation;

-- Collecting data for improved warranty, recall, defect and hold management; and

-- Decreasing integration costs by as much as 80% for additional projects through a larger network of providers, improving the competitive bid processes.

Revving Up at Canton

The Canton plant took Nissan just two-and-a-half years to go from conception to production. With market demand high for its products, Nissan launched six new models in 14 months at the plant - including the Quest minivan, Armada full-size sport utility vehicle, Titan full-size pickup truck and the Altima sedan. Additionally, the plant makes the QX56, luxury brand Infiniti's first full-size sport utility vehicle and the first North American-built Infiniti. The Canton plant plays a large role in Nissan's growth strategy.

Nissan now has a complete line of full-size vehicles - which are unique to North America - and require full-size production to match. By using the Nissan Production Way, the plant's engineers can take advantage of their expertise in sequenced and simultaneous manufacturing to bring more new vehicles to the marketplace, faster.

The Nissan team uses Proficy(TM) Tracker and HMI/SCADA CIMPLICITY(R) software from GE Fanuc in Smyrna and Canton at the heart of its Production Management Control System (PMCS) to add as much intelligence to the manufacturing floor as possible. The Canton plant's PMCS is a critical component of Nissan's integrated manufacturing strategy that requires a collaborative effort with the company's supply chain, providing a foundation for a Just-In-Time (JIT) environment. Other major plant systems, connected to CIMPLICITY, include the Nissan Energy Management and Control (NEMAC) and the Paint Control Room (PCR). Additionally, the system includes GE Fanuc controllers, Proficy Machine Edition software and more than 300 different plant-floor operator stations.

"The most important aspect of the technology is that Nissan can achieve flexible manufacturing," explains Rich Breuning, automotive marketing director for GE Fanuc Automation. "The team can constantly change routing rules, refining processes to restore sequence and minimize costs. This truly is a technology environment that enables continuous improvement."

The Road to Productivity

With the technology in place at the new plant - and production kicking into high gear - Nissan stands to continue its tradition of driving away with recognition for the most productive plants. The team has implemented a full factory-wide system for a major new facility in record time and helped Nissan build upon its strategy for full-size vehicle production. The scalable PMCS can continue to meet the plant's needs, as demand continues to climb for Nissan vehicles and production stays in the fast lane.

GE Fanuc Automation - www.gefanuc.com

Nissan North America, Inc. - www.nissanusa.com