Parker Hannifin Corporation is a global leader in ‘Motion and Control Technologies’ working within eight operating groups which spans the core of motion technologies – electromechanical, hydraulic and pneumatic. Parker was founded 1918 in Cleveland, Ohio, USA. Through acquisitions the company became Parker Hannifin Corporation in 1957.

Our customers’ requirements on delivery reliability are higher than our ability to deliver depending on that our suppliers’ lead-times are longer than our customers requested lead-times. In response we have developed high level of flexibility, safety stocks and buffer capacity to manage our customers’ requirements. Buffer capacity is expensive and we need to set a price on lead-time to increase our knowledge about how to best improve procurement in order to be competitive. The result from the KOPeration project was a good start since we learned how to identify bottleneck lead-times and how to manage them, and to some extent also how to eliminate them. Still it is challenging to clearly see the actual payoff from reducing lead-times which means that we in some situations do not prioritize short lead-times in projects involving procurement and instead focus on traditional measurements. Through this project we expect to complement our knowledge from KOPeration with how to estimate savings in our future and ongoing supply projects involving purchasing and its implications on manufacturing.