2.2 Lean facility layout system
Lean manufacturing is a production system born in Japan, based on the Toyota Production System. This was founded on certain central ideas: the most significant are total quality
management, total productive maintenance and the ‘just in time’. The first is related to the quality of the product, of the process itself and of each element related to the production
process. The second refers to the strategic role of maintenance activities, while the last refers to the optimization of the logistic flow so as to decrease stock levels. The central idea of lean manufacturing is waste elimination , which is essential to increase profitability. The elimination or reduction of waste, in fact, is oriented towards both efficiency and quality.