Porsche already has orders for 10,000 units of its new roadster, the Boxster, which it plans to introduce later this year as its least-expensive model. In 1997 it will roll out a new version of the famed 911. But the innovations the Japanese initiated are being continued by the German engineers. Workers on the line submit 2,500 suggestions a month. The factory is clean and quiet, its huge six-cylinder motors built with remarkable efficiency.
Nobody stands around.
No half-built engines sit to the side of the assembly line. And there are no bins of spare parts through which workers have to dig. The parts needed for assembly hang on carts that are pulled down the line with the engines, so that workers do not have to leave their work space. Porsche management says the efficiency improvements are measured in more than just the company's return to profitability. It has reduced the assembly time for one of its speedsters from 120 hours to 72.