ABSTRACT
The principles of Lean Manufacturing defined by Taichii Ohno, the creator of the Toyota Production System (TPS), have been successfully applied across industries. For the pharmaceutical industry the largest driver for pricing is the time and energy spent on product development. One of the most successful applications of Lean principles within the development environment is again attributed to Toyota. The Toyota Product Development System (TPDS) is different to the TPS and reflects the principles and values Toyota has used to build a reputation as the benchmark of automotive quality. The challenge for the R&D environment is translating the Voice of the Customer (VOC) into terms which resonate in the discovery and development environment. 'Design standardization' in the automotive world is achieved through modularity, common architecture, and where possible using shared components. One of the basic tenets of all OpEx philosophies is that through the broad application of standardization the end result is greater flexibility.
