Service Offering
Manufacturing OEE Improvement
Unlock the full potential of manufacturing productivity by accurately measuring and enhancing Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE). Manufacturers seeking to understand, benchmark, and optimize their organization's productivity, effectiveness, and costs partner with Catalant’s OEE Consultants to:
Approach
Achieve Results with Improved OEE
Our team of 1–3 experienced operations Consultants will conduct an in-depth analysis of data from your manufacturing operations and carry out onsite observations of production activities within selected processes over a 1–2-day period.
01
Align and educate
Train key stakeholders and team members in the definition and mechanics of OEE/OPE, and align on the strategic impact these metrics have on operations.
02
Assess OEE/OPE performance
Obtain an OEE/OPE breakdown from the main process bottlenecks and pacemaker(s) to create a performance baseline and uncover loss categories.
03
Identify and validate improvement levers
Map losses to potential improvement levers by category (Availability, Performance, Quality), then validate root causes through data analysis and structured problem-solving. Prioritize opportunities based on impact and feasibility.
04
Develop an improvement implementation plan
Translate validated levers into a practical, prioritized improvement roadmap. Define initiatives, owners, milestones, and KPIs to drive OEE/OPE gains.
05
Execute and monitor
Implement the plan with disciplined execution and governance. Track progress against targets, iterate as needed, and establish sustainable practices to maintain and build on gains.
Winning Together
OEE Improvement Use Cases
Problem
A private equity company acquired a Tier One automotive supplier facing fierce competition due to low productivity and high costs.
Action
A diagnostic was conducted and identified key issues in labor productivity, indirect materials, and scrap. This led to:
- The creation of an improvement transformation team to address opportunities in manufacturing, maintenance, industrial engineering, and procurement functions
- Identification of 20-25 initiatives that would deliver results within 6-10 months
Results
After a 3-month implementation focused on improving OEE, the company achieved:
- 10% increase in production output
- Reduced changeover lead time by 50% by using SMED
- KPIs and detailed routines for supervisors that helped optimize machine speed and minimize unplanned interruptions
Plastics Manufacturing Turnaround
A consumer goods enterprise faced high operations costs and low OEE. Eight key project initiatives were identified to improve OEE and decrease costs. This led to the facilitation of eight cross-functional teams to address downtime, scrap, and cycle time losses, in addition to the implementation of a manufacturing performance system. As a result, OEE improved from 65% to 83% and the company realized annual savings of $5MM.
Maintenance & Reliability Improvement
A large pharma-chemical company was facing increased maintenance costs alongside declining asset performance. They wanted to improve fixed costs and maintenance and engineering performance, but the executive team was not aligned on where to allocate resources. After undergoing an OEE assessment of equipment criticality involving maintenance, engineering, and operations departments, they gained standardized metrics and effective fund allocation.
featured experts
Manufacturing OEE Improvement Consultants
Yorgos F.
20+ years of experience in manufacturing and transformation
Former McKinsey Associate Partner with 10 years of operating experience at Rolls-Royce and Toyota. Expertise includes manufacturing, production, maintenance, procurement, and supply chain.
Michael F.
25+ years of consulting and operating experience focused in strategic operations and Lean Six Sigma
Former McKinsey consultant with key skills including strategic alignment/planning, leadership coaching, continuous improvement cost reduction, and margin enhancement.
Chad B.
25+ years of experience in operational excellence manufacturing
Former Deloitte consultant with 10+ years of operating experience at IBM and AlixPartners. Expertise includes process improvement, lean enterprise, Six Sigma, materials, and program/project management.
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