CASE STUDY
A Machine Builder
Case Studies & InterviewsSep 2026
“I am sinking.” Shop-floor teaching cut supply chain lead times 84–92%, build times 66%, throughput 92% — and made the company profitable within months.
A Lean thinker and hands-on practitioner who has transformed traditional companies into Total Lean Enterprises. We mentor, speak, and address conferences and seminars, and have authored publications on Lean Manufacturing, leadership, case studies, and management.
There are not too many people in the world who have taken a conventional organisation and transformed it into a lean one. We have done it twice, from the ground up — from the CEO's chair in India and Indonesia, and then as a Consultant.
Markets: America, India, Asia, Europe.
Throughput time reduced 96–97% — generally regarded as India's first end-to-end lean factory transformation, recognised on the shop floor by Toyota's own visiting team.
How it happened
Mysore Kirloskar Ltd (MKL) was the pioneer in machine-tool manufacturing in India — over 90% of the Hubli factory's output exported to first-world countries since the early 1960s, TUV-certified quality. The 1980s recession closed dealerships across America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand, and the small, price-sensitive domestic market couldn't absorb the lost export capacity.
Our Managing Director heard Dr. Schonberger speak on Just-in-Time and decided to become a JIT company. I was transferred to head the Hubli SBU and implement it. There was no training, no consultants, no seminars, and no examples in India to visit — today I consider that a blessing.
I self-taught through experiments, mistakes, and failures — flow, velocity, exposing problems and solving them. We did away with the conventional Production Planning & Control and Inspection departments; customer orders drove production FIFO, the entire process run by workmen from procurement to shipping, coordinated visually — no spreadsheets, no computers. Our best performers became lean leaders.
We never expected to see such a factory in India.TOYOTA'S VISITING TEAM — on seeing the Hubli factory
Bridgeport Perkasa. A five-year-old US–Indonesian joint venture had trained staff and installed plant — and had never shipped a single machine. The chairman told me, “I don't know what to do with this company.” Within six months of applying lean thinking to product, supply chain, and quality together, we were swamped with orders from Asia and Europe — a turnaround visited by the Indonesian President and the American Ambassador.
A senior colleague in another city, with whom I'd bounce ideas and strategies, was of great value in the early days of JIT implementation — before he left the company as the harder work was still ahead.
Leadership roles across industry
“I am sinking.” Shop-floor teaching cut supply chain lead times 84–92%, build times 66%, throughput 92% — and made the company profitable within months.
The plant looked more like a warehouse than a factory. It came down to three days of raw material inventory — and revenue went up.
Five years old and never once profitable. A lean operating system built from the floor up made it operationally profitable in the eighth month.
TextilesFloricultureChemicalsPackaging
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and many more since 1990
From inception, Stratmann Consulting has been different from a conventional consulting company. We are a network of highly experienced people who come together if, when, and where a client needs them. What I try to do in every engagement is build a team inside the client's own organisation, so they can take the work forward without staying dependent on outside help.
I represented my university in cricket and basketball, and played hockey, football, volleyball, badminton, and table tennis — squash came later. I've traveled to more than fifty countries, read widely — self-improvement, psychology, suspense, and professional books — and love being around family.