Remember all of the flak General
Motors caught when customers learned the Cadillacs they were buying shared the
same platform with Oldsmobile? It was a public relations blunder that undoubtedly
resulted in some unhappy customers and lost sales. But that little incident did
not stop the practice of platform consolidation from occurring. In fact, practically
every automotive company in the world is looking to reduce its number of platforms
as a way to cut costs and improve quality.
Such a strategy makes sense.
Platform consolidation can help automakers save anywhere between $50 million
and $200 million in body welding, as well as in engineering, testing and tooling
costs. Platform consolidation will also help the car companies in areas such
as sequence of build, architecture and manufacturing processes. And ultimately,
it will help bring new vehicles to the market faster.
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In the purest sense, two
vehicles are considered to have a common platform if they share the “underbody,”
or the foundation, of a vehicle. But in the truest sense – and the way Harbour
defines it – two cars share a common platform if they share the underbody, plus
the suspension and powertrain that go with it. All that’s needed to make a unique
vehicle, then, is the body shell and interior.
A platform can be slightly
widened or narrowed, shortened or lengthened and still be part of a common platform
as long as no major stamping changes occur to the underbody. Such was the case
with the original Toyota Avalon, which shared a common platform with the Camry
but was lengthened by changing the center floor stampings.
In the past, a car’s structure
came from the frame. But today, with all of the testing and validation taking
place in the shell and underbody – particularly in the area of safety – every
platform redesign is a very expensive proposition. Adopting a common platform
can represent a huge saving in crash testing alone.
While platform consolidation
means cars may share essentially the same foundation, it does not mean models
will ride or look the same. Cars could have common platforms with mostly different
exterior bodies.
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By GlobalDataHonda is very good at producing
cars with common platforms and very different exterior parts. The Accord, for
example, has just one underbody. But it can be shortened or widened, and has
three different body shells for the three different areas of the world – North
America, Europe and Asia – where it is sold. Despite having many different stamped
parts, Honda realizes a great deal of savings by having common locating points,
and through the use of common sequencing, vehicle architecture and “shingling”.
All of these common steps help Honda save engineering, time and tooling costs.
Making each car look different
is up to the stylists, who until recently have mostly opposed platform consolidation
by using the argument that it “ties their hands.” But if styling is
restricted by platform consolidation, then maybe it is time to rethink their
approach to styling. Platform consolidation should not limit a designer’s ability
to create different vehicles in areas that matter most to customers – the body
shell and the interior.
The biggest problem with
platform consolidation is how to make it happen without alienating customers.
Low-end buyers certainly will be pleased to know if some of the parts of their
cars are used on high-end vehicles. But high-end owners don’t like to think
they are getting low-end parts in their cars and trucks. The truth is, most
customers don’t know and don’t care about vehicle platforms. If so, then “don’t
ask, don’t tell” may be the auto companies’ best policy.
So far, the company moving
fastest into platform consolidation is Volkswagen. VW sales in the United States
climbed 44 percent from 1998 to 1999, to more than 315,000, and the company
has been widely credited with a dynamic marketing strategy that appeals to young
car buyers. But VW’s bottom line also has been enhanced through aggressive platform
consolidation. Eventually every vehicle produced by VW worldwide – and that
includes Audi – will come from one of only four platforms.
Japanese automakers have
not been as aggressive in platform consolidation as VW. But because of their
lower tooling costs, the Japanese companies have not felt compelled to move
at a faster rate.
The U.S. companies have
not implemented platform consolidation as quickly as VW or the Japanese, but
that is expected to change. Over the next several years, more and more platform
consolidations will occur and other common manufacturing methods will be implemented
to save time and money, and improve quality and production. In other words,
platform consolidation makes sense – and cents.
