> Plus, the engineers told me, the cost models are proven. Some manufactures, they said, actually hand their own parts to Munro asking them to use their model to see how close they can get to the actual cost of manufacture. Munro says their numbers always come very close, and that they’ve even been accused of having insider information. Munro isn’t just there to help engineers learn about how the competition designs and assembles its cars, it’s also there to help automakers—who really should be called “auto assemblers”—figure out if they’re getting ripped off by their parts suppliers. Knowing exactly how much it costs to build a wheel bearing, for example, can act as leverage for negotiation against a supplier of that part. At the same time, suppliers also go to Munro to learn. If, for example, one of their competitors is selling a part for what seems like impossibly too little, the supplier might ask Munro to tear it down and figure out how the competitor is saving cost.
Re:A Company That Tears Cars Apart to Find Out How They're B...
by rsp1984 on Monday February 05, 2018 @07:08PM
(#16313431)
BMW certainly doesn't pay them to rip apart an i3. Their competitors do.
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Re:A Company That Tears Cars Apart to Find Out How They're B...
by gwern on Monday February 05, 2018 @07:19PM
(#16313486)
BMW certainly might:
Re:A Company That Tears Cars Apart to Find Out How They're B...
by icc97 on Tuesday February 06, 2018 @07:10AM
(#16315739)
Hopefully Tesla takes seriously what Munro is saying.