Production Modernisation as Pariah
While companies attribute a high significance to the development of new products, the same is true only in part for planning corresponding production. This has been illustrated by the latest survey by the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research ISI , Karlsruhe. At the more than 1600 manufacturing industry companies interviewed, human resources capacities for planning of production modernisation averages only 0.4 percent of employees. That amounts to only a tenth of the number of staff members employed in product-related research and development. The chemical industry leads in this category with approximately 0.5 percent, while mechanical engineering brings up the rear at 0.3 percent. According to the Fraunhofer-ISI investigation, modernisation of production often takes place only in reaction to pressures, for example when new products necessitate a process innovation. The lack of resources means strategic planning is practically impossible. Even companies which have brought product innovations to market over the last two years make no significantly measurable more investment in the modernisation of their production operations. Moreover, the amount of human resources devoted to process innovation is not growing alongside the increasing share of staff employed in research and development. This contradicts the widespread theory that there is a close connection between product innovation and process innovation. In the majority of cases, the planning tasks associated with modernisation of production is taken care of by general management, production management or plant management, instances often already overloaded with daily business activities. The low level of resources available for planning modernisation measures in production can be explained at least in part by these time bottlenecks. The most important trigger for modernisation is market development of a company's own products, i.e. fluctuations in sales figures as well as changes in series size and in the number of variants. Technology change, however, is attributed lesser importance. In the near future planners are expecting more major production changes from new materials developments than due to information technology. Researchers of the Fraunhofer-ISI have drawn more detailed conclusions regarding energy and raw materials prices. Companies with more than 500 employees cite this topic as least important. In contrast, however, almost 60 percent of smaller companies indicated that expenses for energy and raw materials play a "very important" or at least "important" role. New trends in organisational concepts are often the featured topic at conferences. However such conferences have a comparatively small significance as information sources. Companies receive their information primarily at trade fairs and exhibitions. Medium-sized and large companies also cite machine and systems vendors as an important information source. Large companies also draw new information from competing and allied companies as well as from contacts to research institutes. In terms of written information sources, companies rely primarily on traditional print media, specialty magazines, books and research reports. Almost 75 percent of companies can be reached easily via printed media, while electronic dissemination of information through the Internet, specialised databases or newsletters only reaches every second company. Furthermore the low rate of Internet use at medium-sized companies is remarkable; these companies show a higher usage level for magazines.The Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research ISI complements the techno-scientific spectrum of the Fraunhofer Society with economic and societal aspects, analysing technological developments, their market potentials and their impacts on economy, state and society. The Institutes interdisciplinary teams focus their work especially on the fields of energy, environment, production, communication and biotechnology, as well as regional research and research policy.
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