Organizations for Global Simultaneous New Model Launching

Abstract

Simultaneously launching new models globally becomes a problem with an increase in global production. Although Toyota Motor Corporation and Hyundai Motor Company have different production systems, they have almost at the same time created organizations with similar functions to solve the problem of simultaneously launching new models globally. These organizations are Toyota's Global Production Center (GPC) and Hyundai's pilot center. Both were new organizations with their own pilot production lines instead of conventional mass production lines. However, Toyota's GPC, which is a part of the mother factory system, plays a complementary role vis-à-vis the company's domestic plants, while at Hyundai's pilot center, which is a part of the model factory system, the pilot center functions independently of the domestic plants. This is how Toyota reduces the burden on its competitive mother factories in Japan, while Hyundai opts to maintain a distance from its domestic factories, which are not a) Faculty of Business Administration, Toyo University, 5-28-20 Hakusan, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, Japan, ruiberd@gmail.com A version of this paper was presented at the ABAS Conference 2017 Winter (Suh, 2017) © 2017 Youngkyo Suh. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Factory strategy

“…In addition, the study set three factors as strategic reasons for location: access to low-cost production (locations with cheap labor and material costs), market access, and access to skills and knowledge. 2 There have been many studies on the role of mother plants with discussions on global plant networks in international management theory, and even studies of Japanese firms (Amano, 2005;Hamamatsu, 2017;Oki, 2012Oki, , 2014Oki, , 2015Oki, , 2016Suh, 2016Suh, , 2017aSuh, , 2017b. and a measurement scale for choosing the top three "reasons for locating and using a plant" from among supplier proximity, labor availability, usability of skills and know-how, market proximity, sociopolitical reasons, competition, energy, and other factors.…”