In 2019 Polycon began serving clients in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Why manufacturers in both countries face the same problems as Australian ones, and how we support them across time zones.
The first enquiry from New Zealand came from a manufacturer of agricultural equipment with a problem we knew well: a plastic housing that cracked in cold weather, a toolmaker overseas and an internal team stretched across too many projects. The first from the United Kingdom came a few months later, from a packaging manufacturer wanting to restart a stalled Lean Six Sigma program. Different products, different markets, the same underlying challenges.
That is why, in 2019, Polycon International formally extended its services to clients in New Zealand and the United Kingdom.
Why these markets
New Zealand and the United Kingdom share a great deal with Australia. Manufacturing is dominated by small and mid-sized companies, many of them exporters, competing on quality and innovation rather than scale. Many source tooling and components from Asia. Many face skills shortages in specialist engineering areas such as plastics design, tooling and statistical quality methods. And many cannot justify a full-time specialist for every discipline they occasionally need.
That is exactly the gap Polycon was founded to fill.
What we offer in both countries
- Product development and plastic part design, delivered largely remotely with on-site visits at key stages.
- Injection moulding and tooling support, including DFM, mould design review, trials and supplier management, in local markets and offshore.
- Lean, Six Sigma and Kaizen programs, with on-site workshops and events, and remote coaching between visits.
- Lean Six Sigma Yellow, Green and Black Belt training built around live projects, as we described in our belt training approach.
Working across time zones
Melbourne overlaps comfortably with New Zealand's working day. The United Kingdom is more of a stretch, but the overlap of early mornings in one country and late afternoons in the other works well for structured reviews. In practice, the work combines:
- Scheduled video reviews at each project milestone.
- Shared CAD, data and documents, so work continues in both time zones.
- On-site visits for the activities that need them: gemba walks, kaizen events, trials and training.
What stays the same
Our approach does not change with geography. We start from the business problem, measure before acting, work where the problem happens and leave our clients' teams more capable than we found them. The engineering is the same in Auckland, Birmingham or Melbourne: plastics still shrink, processes still vary and good design is still the cheapest cost reduction a manufacturer will ever make.
If you are a manufacturer in New Zealand or the United Kingdom with a product, process or quality challenge, we would be glad to talk.
