Exhaust Tips Development Case for Toyota

In 2010, due to the customer (Toyota)'s localized procurement needs and the opportunity of product supply chain restructuring, the business scale gradually expanded. Cost and delivery time were unavoidable issues for Toyota. Cost reduction and efficiency improvement have always been permanent topics for the company. Therefore, the focus to solve this issue at that time was to seek suitable suppliers locally. Hexin, as a local supplier in the exhaust field cooperating with Honda, became one of the candidates for Toyota's procurement staff. Through communication, investigation and QCDDM audit and evaluation, it was recognized by Toyota and obtained the supplier number.

The project was initiated in October of the same year, and the development of decorative tailpipes began. After a series of development work such as mold design, sample production and test verification, the decorative tailpipes passed various tests including welding sensitization, product appearance, welding strength and installation dimensions, meeting the scheduled development requirements. Hexin was designated to produce decorative tailpipes, thus becoming a part of Toyota's supply chain.

Through the development of Toyota's decorative tailpipes, based on the evaluation and analysis of process technology, the integrated hydroforming process was adopted, along with a one-out-two design structure and lightweight technology (achieving a 30% material weight reduction).

Our decorative tailpipes are applied to major Toyota models such as Camry, RAV4 and Corolla.

* Design and manufacturing of tooling and gauges;

* Design, development and manufacturing of special equipment for production capacity improvement;

* Various product performance testing and verification (including welding sensitization testing, welding strength testing, corrosion resistance testing, air tightness testing, material physical property testing, product precision section testing, etc.);

* Implementation of various PPAP requirements, etc.

Both efficiency and cost were improved. The procurement cycle was shortened from 6 months to 20 days, effectively reducing the supply risk caused by tight production capacity demand. The procurement BOM cost was reduced by 80%. For this, the customer awarded Hexin the "Special Contribution Award for Original Price" as the highest honor and recognition.