CASE STUDY

Operations, spanning languages, currencies, and labor markets

Operating across multiple countries gave this wire harness manufacturer significant scale, but it also created complexity.

Each location had developed its own engineering practices, costing methods, labor standards, and data systems. Teams worked in different languages and currencies, with labor rates that varied considerably by region.

Without a consistent global process, it was difficult to compare costs, share engineering work, or understand why one facility produced a part more profitably than another.

Every location approached costing differently.

Labor standards varied by facility, and each team could interpret manufacturing requirements in its own way. Material costs were equally inconsistent because locations purchased components from hundreds of suppliers at different prices.

As a result, profit margins varied from one facility to another. Margins could even differ between similar parts produced within the same location.

Without a common costing standard, executives could not easily compare performance across the organization or identify low-margin parts before they affected profitability.

The manufacturer employed hundreds of engineers across multiple regions, including areas with lower engineering costs. However, incompatible systems and inconsistent data structures prevented the company from taking full advantage of those resources.

Engineering work completed in one country could not easily be used by another location. If production of an existing part moved to a different facility, the receiving team often had to re-engineer it in another system.

This duplicated effort, delayed production transfers, and limited the company’s ability to assign engineering work to the most appropriate or cost-effective region.

The manufacturer implemented Harness Suite to establish a consistent engineering, costing, and manufacturing framework across its global operations.

Harness Suite provided a centralized SaaS platform that could support multiple locations, languages, currencies, labor rates, and customer costing requirements. With shared standards and structured engineering data, the company could create a part once and use that information across the organization.

By standardizing how labor, materials, and manufacturing processes were calculated, Harness Suite created a more reliable foundation for costing. Regional differences could still be reflected in each quote or production plan, but those differences were applied within a consistent global framework.

This helped teams identify the true drivers behind cost differences and make better sourcing, quoting, and production decisions.

Harness Suite gave company leadership an executive dashboard with visibility across locations, customers, and parts. Instead of waiting for financial results to reveal a problem, executives could identify low-margin parts and investigate the underlying causes.

This visibility allowed management to focus attention on the parts and locations with the greatest opportunities for improvement.

By connecting its global operations through Harness Suite, the manufacturer was able to:

Harness Suite helped transform a collection of independent processes into a coordinated global operation. Engineering teams could collaborate across regions, production could move with less disruption, and executives gained the information needed to manage profitability more effectively.

“Standardize globally. Operate locally. Improve margins everywhere.”

Bring your own multi-location cost and engineering data to a working demo.