Author Note: Bernardo Villarreal is a full professor of Industrial Engineering at the Universidad de Monterrey. His teaching and research interests are in the area of supply chain management and lean initiatives.
Santiago Macias-Sauza works as an external consultant. His areas of expertise are transportation and inventory management. He holds a B.S. on Industrial Engineering from the Universidad de Monterrey. He is currently in the MBA program of the Universidad de Monterrey.
Elsa Garza-Varela holds a B.S. on Industrial Engineering at the Universidad de Monterrey. She currently works as a consultant in Accenture Services and Technology a recognized international consulting firm. Her expertise is on the integration of the supply chain management and finance modules of the ERP SAP.
Abstract. The reduction of transportation costs is an important issue for many companies that need to stay competitive. This work describes the application of a scheme for increasing transportation efficiency to achieve this purpose. This scheme is developed around a modified version of the Operational Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) index used in Total Productive Management (TPM). This is adapted to be used as the main performance measure in transport operations. Availability, performance and quality wastes are identified using Value Stream Mapping of the operation. The implementation is carried out in the routing operation of a Mexican firm. The improvement initiatives are still in progress but the projected and available results are provided.