Abstract
Mexico has received a lot of foreign investment that has brought in a wide range of novel production philosophies, such as Single Minute Exchange of Dies (SMED). Despite its popularity and reported effectiveness, Mexican companies often quit SMED implementation as they consider it challenging. This usually happens when organizations are not familiarized enough with each one of the SMED stages or do not know how they are interrelated. In this article the interrelations among the different SMED implementation stages by means of a structural equations model are analyzed. Data for constructing the model were gathered from a survey administered to 250 employees from the Mexican maquiladora industry. The survey assessed the importance of 14 activities belonging to the four SMED stages. The descriptive analyses of these stages were conducted and integrated into a structural equations model as latent variables, to find their level of dependency. The model was constructed using WarpPLS 5 software, and direct, indirect, and total effects among variables are analyzed and validated. Results from the model revealed that Stage 1 of SMED implementation, known as the Identification Stage, has both direct and indirect effects on all the other SMED stages, being the most important stage.
Highlights
Many companies respond to the globalization phenomenon by establishing subsidiaries abroad, since this technique allows organizations to reach proximity to target markets
We proposed six hypotheses to relate the four conceptual stages of Single Minute Exchange of Dies (SMED)
By means of a structural equations model we demonstrated that all these relationships were statistically significant
Summary
Many companies respond to the globalization phenomenon by establishing subsidiaries abroad, since this technique allows organizations to reach proximity to target markets. In the case of Mexico, subsidiaries are usually known as maquiladoras [1], and they belong to global manufacturing networks that work under the attractive benefits offered by the hosts countries. Some of these benefits include available infrastructure, high training levels, and low production costs [1]. Many parent companies seek to establish maquiladoras in the Mexican territory to benefit mainly from low labor costs, less restrictive unions and regulations, and greater proximity to target markets [4]. Mexico is a facilitator to parent countries since Mexican maquiladoras offer competitiveness and proximity to two major markets, the United States and Complexity
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
