Researched
Lean Production (Toyota)
Ohno and Toyota (from the late 1940s) replace giant batches with just-in-time flow, built-in quality and continuous improvement.
Open in the interactive tree →Taiichi Ohno built the Toyota Production System on two pillars: just-in-time supply with kanban cards, and jidoka, machines that stop themselves when something is wrong, an idea from Sakichi Toyoda's looms that halted when a thread broke. Small batches and fast changeovers let a car maker with a small market compete with Detroit. The approach spread worldwide in the 1980s as lean manufacturing and now shapes supply chains, software teams and hospitals.