Tony Lane, the latest addition to the team!

Tony has worked in process and product improvement for 34 years both at the cutting edge of technology and at an administrational level.

For five years Tony worked in electronics research for a mass producer of roller bearings where his remit was to make machine tools work faster, better and more reliably. He also worked on the electronic detection of faulty parts through Fourier analysis of the noise signature of the parts during the manufacturing stage.

In 1982 he joined Plessey research as a technologist working on GaAs (Gallium Arsenide) devices and, on gaining a BA Hons in physics, maths and electronics, became Principal Scientist then Chief Engineer. Whilst at Plessey, which later became GEC Marconi, he invented the world’s first GaAs Multifunction MMIC and was granted a number of patents on GaAs devices, MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical Systems) and electronic packaging. He also received awards for “Individual Contribution” and “Products Under Development”. During this period he worked on projects with the UK, US, and European defence and space agencies and industries. He also presented numerous technical papers at national and international conferences.

In 1999 Tony gained a post graduate certificate in engineering management through the Engineering Management Partnership (a partnership of major British Institutions including IEE, IMech, IOP, IChemE, ICE etc.). Tony completed six sigma green belt training and a six sigma project in 2001. He has also been trained extensively on management through the GEC Management College.

In 2002 Tony became Manufacturing Systems manager for “Marconi Optical Systems” and also became a 6 Sigma master black belt. Whilst in this position Tony set up a custom Six Sigma training programme on a site of 400 people which led to total annual savings of £410,000, within 6 months of introduction, against a total spend of £65k (£50k training + £15k project costs) i.e. a 630% ROI in the first 6 months. Between 2002 and 2004 the 6 Sigma programme realised annual savings of £2.2M.

During this period he also:

• Initiated and facilitated the development of a bespoke DFx programme loosely based on the Lucas method.

• Organised and implemented, training and facilitation of FMEAs and QFD.

• Initiated and oversaw the development of a bespoke DFM method.

• Liaised with universities on new business improvement methods, primarily WMG at Warwick University.

• Trained people at all levels (operators to VPs) on White Belt, Green belt, Champions, DFSS, DFx and NPI.

• Benchmarked against other businesses to adopt and adapt best practices.

In 2002 Tony took on the role of global continuous improvement manager for Bookham where he was responsible for the creation, implementation and sustaining of a continuous improvement strategy and structure (of which Lean sigma was the main thrust) across 5 sites in England, USA, Switzerland and Canada. During this period Tony was also a member of a global team led by the CFO comprising of vice presidents and senior managers from the UK, Switzerland, Canada and the USA tasked with designing and implementing a global (NPI) New Product Introduction process aimed at streamlining the introduction of new products without compromising cost, quality, safety or reliability.

Tony maintains a keen academic interest in product and system design and the improvement of design using tools such as TRIZ, Axiomatic Design, DFx etc.