Pace Engineering, Inc.  |  Manufacturing Facility  |  Willoughby, OH

Pace Engineering has three competitive advantages that allow it to effectively compete in North America

1.   It has strong technical capabilities that customers call on more and more often as their own technical knowledge is lost to down sizing and retirement. The area of metallurgy on wear parts is Pace engineering's greatest strength and one of the weakest found in our customers. The wear resistance and strength of any part is based on the selection of material and heat-treating process selected. Pace Engineering has a complete heat-treating facility and laboratory, the only machining facility with a complete heat-treating facility among our competitors.

2.   The second advantage that is quickly becoming the most important is through put. This is the time it takes from receipt of an order to the time a part is shipping. With depleting inventories and/or long chains of supply, through put is fast becoming Pace Engineering's greatest advantage in aftermarket orders.

3.   The third advantage is that the costs of manufacturing in the heart of the rust belt are rising slower than the other parts of the United States. This combines with the weak dollar are strengthening our competitive position in North America and against developed country imports. 

Pace Engineering’s relationship with its customers is the relationship between people.  This includes all of the team of people at Pace that handle an account and their counterparts at our customers.  Honestly, candor, and a sense of priorities make a winning combination for any relationship.  The answer to the question lies in the strength of the abilities of the people on both sides to work together to achieve general and specific goals that are mutually beneficial to both parties

The major concern with any relationship is that both parties must benefit from the relationship.  Too often, relationships become totally one sided, and one party loses.  The spirit of an alliance is that both parties are to mutually benefit.

Pace Engineering has worked closely with many customers over the years on product design, material and heat treat specifications and cost reduction engineering alternatives.  This is a free service that has taken place at our facility, at our customer’s facilities or in the field. 

Pace Engineering, Inc. has a number of continuous improvement programs with its customers.  These include assisting on cost effective designs on new products, reducing lead times, reducing inventories, reducing global costs such as trucking or planning costs.  No two customers have the same objectives at the same time, so we have many different programs occurring simultaneously on a wide variety of projects.

Pace Engineering divides its cost reduction program into two parts.  The first step is to identify what global costs can be reduced across the spectrum of parts that we might produce.  This step is identifying the costs together and determines approaches for their reduction.  The second is a part-by-part detail analysis of the print, the method of manufacturing and the quality requirements. This is not a specific project with a start and stop date, but rather a continuing joint venture to drive non-value added costs out of the product and maximize the technology available to achieve cost leadership in a designated area

Each cost saving program is customer specific.  The general parameters include the goal and the milestones and their associated dates.  We set up an Excel spreadsheet to track all activities and results that is emailed weekly to all members of the team involved.  The team normally involves two people from our customer and two from Pace.  All aspects of the total cost are explored.  In the past, direct manufacturing costs have been less than a third of the cost savings.

Pace Engineering, Inc. 4800 Beidler Road   Willoughby, OH 44094