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high mix manufacturing

Manufacturing and Operations Strategy Consultants

Xilinx, Inc.

 DEHART CONSULTING has provided innovative solutions to our operational space planning and facility design needs on several occasions.  DCI consultants bridge the gap between operations and facility management to assure that we arrive at win-win solutions for our stakeholders ... 

Forrest James, Sr. Director, Global Real Estate and Site Services at Xilinx, Inc.

Partners

As a firm, we believe in the power of knowledge and it shows in our people. We bring years of industry expertise to each of our customers' problems, because a learning curve is the enemy of immediacy. Our focus on knowledge, combined with diversity of experience and unique skills, defines us a manufacturing consulting organization. We leverage this knowledge and experience to solve problems, with measurable results, and help our clients achieve their strategic objectives.

Dale DeHart

Dale DeHart

Professional Experience

Principal - DeHart Consulting, LLC
Vice President Operations - $200 million RF Amplifier Manufacturer
Vice President Operations - $100 million RF Reception Equip Manufacturer
Vice President Operations - $50 million Optoelectronic Switch Manufacturer
Vice President Manufacturing - $30 million Industrial Lighting Manufacturer
Director Manufacturing - $40 million Mfr. Communication Equipment

Dale founded the firm and serves as its principal. He consults in the areas of Operations Strategy, Materials and Manufacturing Cost Reduction, Plant Layout, Continuous Flow Manufacturing, and Supply Chain Development. Dale has extensive hands-on experience in the design, development, and implementation of continuous flow manufacturing, and demand-pull scheduling methodologies. He has managed the complete transition of several companies from traditional, functionally oriented production lines to a High Performance World-Class factory environment.

Dale's consulting practice is focused on helping manufacturing companies design their infrastructure and major business processes to deal with the rapidly changing requirements of future markets. Dale is experienced in developing innovative operations strategies, developing high-performance supply bases and managing lead-time reduction programs, continuous flow plant designs, process re-engineering, and high performance work team development.

Prior to founding DeHart Consulting, Dale held senior operations positions in companies such as Hewlett-Packard, TRW, and Spectrian. In addition, he has been an early member of successful high-tech start-up companies, managing both Engineering and Operations functions.

Education

Dale holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from the California State Polytechnic University; a Masters Degree in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University; and a Masters Degree in Business from UCLA.

Personal

Mr. DeHart was born in Southern California. He is married and has four children.

Mike Stephens

Mike G. Stephens

Professional Experience

Director, Engineering Services - Satellite Electronics Manufacturer
Vice President, Operations - Lighting Systems Manufacturer
Manufacturing Engineering Manager - RF Components Manufacturer
Engineering Manager – Hand-held Computer Manufacturer

Profit-minded, performance oriented manufacturing and operations professional offering 25+ years progressive experience in Plant Operations, R&D, Applications Engineering, Field Service, Manufacturing Engineering and Off Shore Procurement. A hands-on strategic planner, decision maker and problem solver with a proven track record of leadership and excellence in manufacturing by utilizing Lean Manufacturing and TQM techniques. Profit and Loss responsibility in addition to providing technical liaison support to external customers and suppliers.

  • Development and setup of electronic manufacturing processes, both domestic and offshore.
  • Leader of ISO 9000 certification teams.
  • Mechanical Design of laser diode transceivers for SAN market.
  • Set up of micro-electronic assembly line to manufacture integrated laser circuits: scribe/saw process through final test and burn-in.
  • Evaluation of battery manufacturing processes for computer applications
  • Produced complex cable TV power hybrids and communication devices for the military.
  • Responsible for all hermetic semiconductor devices produced in the Far East.
  • Set up of seven offshore semiconductor and PCB assembly facilities in the Far East and Mexico. Complete responsibility for plan layout, staffing, training, equipment selection and process control.
  • Created microelectronics facility for Xerox. Chief Engineer for microelectronics packaging at all Xerox division. Full manufacturing responsibility for R&D transfer to production.
  • Developed proprietary process to produce charge coupled devices for copy machines.
  • Formalized basic design rules for microelectronics packaging at each of the six companies.
  • Increased manufacturing yields to 95% from levels as low as 50% through material selection, process design and analysis of compatibility and tolerance at the design level.
  • Evaluated economics of automation and use of robotics. Where appropriate, designed and installed complete systems, reducing product labor content by 50%.

Education

Mechanical Engineering Program, Cerritos College, 1973
Business Major at Cal State University Fullerton, CA 1973 –1974
Served on S.E.M.I. Standards Committee on Hermetic Devices

Personal

Mr. Stephens was born in Southern California. He is married to Jackie and has four children.

 

sandra-kuzmina-100

Sandra Kuzmina

Professional Experience

  • Technical Graphics
  • Supply Chain analysis and management
  • IT Project Management
  • Information Technology Governance
  • Software Testing
  • Web Development
  • Programming
Ms. Kuzmina has over 5 years of design experience in a variety of disciplines, including marketing, manufacturing, and printing. Her professional background includes development and implementation of work-spaces within a variety of environments, including factories, offices, and financial institutions.
In her most recent assignments, Ms. Kuzmina was responsible for the testing and implementation of a custom-design shop floor lot tracking system. She reported directly to the Project Manager and her responsibilities included programming, planning, design specifications, and dynamic graphic and data linkage between Angular and .NET. She collaborated with in-house specialists for planning Work Order formation; data connectivity and final testing.
Recent/current clients include SIA E-pasaule and Peak Performance.

Education

Ms. Kuzmina holds a BS in Telecommunications from Riga Technical University and a Masters in Information Technology. Her software experience includes Microsoft Works, TurboCAD, Open Office, Microsoft Access, MS Project, SAP, Windows 7/XP, Linus/Ubuntu; and programming in C/AL, Python, HTML, SQL, ABAP

Personal

Ms. Kuzmina was born in Riga, Latvia and resides in Southern California. She is fluent in English, American Sign Language, Latvian, Russian and enjoys swimming, cinema and theatre.

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Nathan Cota

Professional Experience

  • Software Development
  • Software Testing
  • Web Development
  • Software API Integrations
Mr. Cota has over 15 years of experience in software development and is a full-stack developer. His professional background includes C#/.NET development, MSSQL and MongoDB database architecture, and the development of ope APIs for software integration. He has work with manufacturing software and developed full applications for the implementation of specific capabilities.
In his most recent assignment, Mr. Cota was responsible for the development of a custom-design shop floor real-time dispatching system, VortexTM.