Dictionary Definition
manufacture
Noun
1 the organized action of making of goods and
services for sale; "American industry is making increased use of
computers to control production" [syn: industry]
2 the act of making something (a product) from
raw materials; "the synthesis and fabrication of single crystals";
"an improvement in the manufacture of explosives"; "manufacturing
is vital to Great Britain" [syn: fabrication]
Verb
1 put together out of components or parts; "the
company fabricates plastic chairs"; "They manufacture small toys"
[syn: fabricate,
construct]
User Contributed Dictionary
English
Etymology
From manufacture.Pronunciation
- ˌmænjuˈfæktʃɚ
- /%m
Extensive Definition
Manufacturing (from Latin manu
factura, "making by hand") is the use of tools and labor to make
things for use or sale. The term may refer to a range of human
activity, from handicraft to high tech, but
is most commonly applied to industrial production, in which
raw
materials are transformed into finished
goods on a large scale.
Manufacturing takes place
under all types of economic
systems. In a free market economy, manufacturing is usually
directed toward the mass production of products
for sale to consumers
at a profit. In a collectivist economy, manufacturing is more
frequently directed by the state to supply a centrally planned
economy. In free market economies, manufacturing occurs under some
degree of government regulation.
Modern manufacturing includes
all intermediate processes required for the production and
integration of a product's components. Some industries, such as
semiconductor
and steel
manufacturers use the term fabrication
instead.
The manufacturing sector is
closely connected with engineering and industrial
design. Examples of major manufacturers in the United
States include General
Motors Corporation, Ford
Motor Company, Chrysler, Boeing, Gates
Rubber Company and Pfizer. Examples in
Europe include France's Airbus and Michelin
Tire.
Context
- The economics and commercial of a company is covered in Business.
- The classification of those Businesses is covered in Industry.
- The economic decisions taken within this activity is covered in Production.
- The law as applied to businesses is covered in Commercial Law.
- The general management of a business is in Management (see also: General manager).
- The political impact of the development of industry is covered in Political economy
- The use of computer technology is covered by Product Lifecycle Management, Advanced Planning and Scheduling and Scheduling (production processes)
History and development
- In its earliest form, manufacturing was usually carried out by a single skilled artisan with assistants. Training was by apprenticeship. In much of the pre-industrial world the guild system protected the privileges and trade secrets of urban artisans.
- Before the Industrial Revolution, most manufacturing occurred in rural areas, where household-based manufacturing served as a supplemental subsistence strategy to agriculture (and continues to do so in places). Entrepreneurs organized a number of manufacturing households into a single enterprise through the putting-out system.
- The beginnings of modern industrial manufacturing are covered in the Industrial Revolution article.
- The development of the modern manufacturing facility is covered in the factory article.
- The development of the applied science behind manufacturing is covered in the industrial process article.
- Toll manufacturing is an arrangement whereby a first firm with specialized equipment processes raw materials or semi-finished goods for a second firm.
Manufacturing systems: The changing methods of manufacturing
- Craft or Guild system
- Putting-out system
- English system of manufacturing
- American system of manufacturing
- Soviet collectivism in manufacturing
- Mass production
- Just In Time manufacturing
- Lean manufacturing
- Flexible manufacturing
- Mass customization
- Agile manufacturing
- Rapid manufacturing
- Prefabrication
- Ownership
- Fabrication
- Publication
Economics of manufacturing
According to some economists, manufacturing is a wealth-producing sector of an economy, whereas a service sector tends to be wealth-consuming. Emerging technologies have provided some new growth in advanced manufacturing employment opportunities in the Manufacturing Belt in the United States. Manufacturing provides important material support for national infrastructure and for national defense.On the other hand, most
manufacturing may involve significant social and environmental
costs. The clean-up costs of hazardous
waste, for example, may outweigh the benefits of a product that
creates it. Hazardous materials may expose workers to health risks.
Developed countries regulate manufacturing activity with labor laws and
environmental
laws. In the U.S, manufacturers are
subject to regulations by the
Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the
United States Environmental Protection Agency. In Europe,
pollution taxes to offset environmental costs are another form of
regulation on manufacturing activity. Labor Unions
and craft guilds
have played a historic role negotiation of worker rights and wages.
Environment laws and labor protections that are available in
developed nations may not be available in the third world.
Tort law
and product
liability impose additional costs on
manufacturing.
Manufacturing in Britain
There has been a considerable
amount of research on factors affecting manufacturing growth and
performance in modern Britain. Major focuses have been
on:
- general trends in manufacturing and the UK economy as a whole;
- specific factors affecting the growth and performance of individual manufacturing firms and industries;
- new product developments, market trends, and other wider business-economic environmental influences;
- plant-level managerial and industrial organizational aspects of manufacturing production; and
- political-legal, educational and training, and other wider societal influences on manufacturing growth, investment, and investment returns.
Britain was the birthplace of
the Industrial Revolution and is still one of the most attractive
countries in the world for direct foreign industrial investment.
However, UK manufacturing firms and industries often significantly
lag behind their overseas competitors in terms of productivity and
various other key performance measures. Of late, such things as
increases in taxation and regulation have also diminished the
favourableness of the political-legal environment for British
industry generally.http://web.onetel.com/~isr/
Manufacturing and investment around the world
Surveys and analyses of trends
and issues in manufacturing and investment around the world focus
on such things as:
- the nature and sources of the considerable variations that occur cross-nationally in levels of manufacturing and wider industrial-economic growth;
- competitiveness; and
- attractiveness to foreign direct investors.
In addition to general
overviews, researchers have examined the features and factors
affecting particular key aspects of manufacturing development. They
have compared production and investment in a range of Western and
non-Western countries and presented case studies of growth and
performance in important individual industries and market-economic
sectors.http://web.onetel.com/~isr/
Taxonomy of manufacturing processes
Taxonomy of manufacturing processesManufacturing categories
Theories
References
Sources
External links
- Cato Institute article:Thriving in a Global Economy: The Truth about U.S. Manufacturing and Trade
- How Everyday Things Are Made: video presentations.
- Manufacturing Solutions
- Manufacturers Directory India
- EEF, the organisation for UK manufacturing
- Marktec Corp-Non-destructive Testing
- AMMTIAC Advanced Materials, Manufacturing, and Testing Information Analysis Center
manufacture in Danish:
Fabrikation
manufacture in German:
Produktion
manufacture in Spanish:
Manufactura
manufacture in Esperanto:
Muntado
manufacture in French:
Industrie manufacturière
manufacture in Croatian:
Manufaktura
manufacture in Indonesian:
Manufaktur
manufacture in Interlingua
(International Auxiliary Language Association):
Manufactura
manufacture in Dutch:
Productieproces
manufacture in Japanese:
製造業
manufacture in Norwegian:
Industri
manufacture in Polish:
Produkcja
manufacture in Portuguese:
Manufatura
manufacture in Finnish:
Valmistustekniikka
manufacture in Swedish:
Tillverkningsindustri
manufacture in Vietnamese:
Khu vực chế tạo
manufacture in Turkish:
İmalat
manufacture in Ukrainian:
Виробництво
Synonyms, Antonyms and Related Words
anatomy, architectonics, architecture, arrangement, artifact, assemble, assembly, basic training,
brainchild, briefing, build, building, cast, casting, child, clearing the decks,
coinage, compose, composition, compound, concoct, concoction, conformation, constitution, construct, construction, contrive, conversion, cook up, counterfeit, crafting, craftsmanship, create, creation, creature, crowning achievement,
cultivation,
devise, devising, distillation, effect, elaborate, elaboration, end product,
equipment, erect, erection, essence, evolve, extract, extraction, extrude, fabric, fabricate, fabrication, fake, familiarization,
fantasize, fashion, fashioning, fixing, forge, forging, form, format, formation, forming, formulate, formulation, foundation, frame, framing, fruit, fudge, fudge together, get up,
getup, groundwork, growing, handicraft, handiwork, harvesting, hatch, hoke up, indite, invent, invention, issue, machining, make, make up, makeready, makeup, making, making ready, manufacturing, mass
production, mass-produce, masterpiece, masterwork, mature, milling, mining, mintage, mobilization, mold, molding, new mintage, offspring, opera, opus, opuscule, organic structure,
organism, organization, originate, origination, outcome, outgrowth, patch together,
pattern, patterning, physique, piece together,
plan, planning, prearrangement, prefabricate, prefabrication, preliminaries, preliminary, preliminary
act, preliminary step, prep, preparation, preparatory
study, prepare, preparing, prepping, prerequisite, pretreatment, processing, produce, producing, product, production, propaedeutic, provision, put together, put
up, putting out, putting together, raise, raising, readying, rear, refining, result, run up, set up, setup, shape, shaping, smelting, spadework, structure, structuring, tectonics, texture, think up, tissue, training, treatment, trial, trump up, tryout, turn out, turning out,
warm-up, warp and woof, weave, web, whomp up, work, workmanship, write