Mass Customization @ Lutron Electronics

A detailed Summary of Mass Customization @ Lutron Electronics

Mass Customization at Lutron Electronics

Keywords identified: competition, innovation, specialization, quality, market share, standardization, modularity, customization, economies of scale, economies of scope, commonality, responsiveness, consensus.

With this paper, the authors are trying to depict how Lutron Electronics transformed itself from a one office company to the giant it is now, by realizing the benefits that could be reaped from moving towards mass customization. As time moved on and people started realizing that the mass production philosophy really did not took into account the customers needs, severe competition drove companies to enter a price war to sell their products at the lowest possible costs to stay in the market. Lutron chose to compete in the market with product differentiation (driven by innovation) and the strategy paid off. Initial success with the new strategy helped Lutron build a product platform they could have expanded upon. The decision makers realized that to grow its business the company needs to keep expanding and develop new markets rather than trying to take control of the market share. It was very interesting to read how Lutron used innovation to open new market segments, which they

The authors mentioned forecasting the customer demand as the ultimate key to successful implementation of mass customization processes but failed to highlight the same in Lutron's case. It will be interesting to see how Lutron handles the uncertainty in demand with the entire cross functional teams in place. The author also mentioned over 15% of the employees being involved with some form of customer service. Again, with cross functional teams in place, it will be interesting to know if there is some kind of dissatisfaction among engineers who might be asked to do something different than their core competency as a part of the job. Is this too stressful and demanding for them?

The five principles mentioned are quoted on Lutron's website too (www.lutron.com/aboutus/5principles). The references used for this article are not sufficient and are used marginally to quote the definitions of the keywords used in the paper. The authors have given an inside or microscopic view of the company. It will be interesting to see the bird's eye view too. For example the suppliers, warehouses, transportation systems, how were these affected by the changes in the core philosophy? There is no notion of a single successful company today, there are successful supply chains competing with other supply chains. If Lutron was making money how did it trickle down to other companies who were a part of the entire supply chain. The authors did not give any financial information as to how the profit margins or revenues increased. I believe it is always good to give out charts or numbers as they catch immediate attention of the readers.

Enterprises in all branches of industry are being forc

Some common words found in the essay are:
Lutron's Lutron, Lutron Electronics, Mass Customization, Lutron Dell, Electronics Keywords, Lumea II, R&D MC, mass customization, lutron electronics, efficiency mass customization, cross functional teams, mass customization product, customization product families, functional teams, cross functional, office spaces, standardized platforms, efficiency mass, paper authors, cross trained, supply chains,

Approximate Word count = 1128
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Technology