Customer Collaboration Counts -- Flextronics depends on collaborative tools to work with clients and connect co-workers

Working closely with customers isn't optional for Flextronics Inc. As a contract manufacturer, everything it builds is based on another company's idea-from the new Xbox video-game system for Microsoft to cell phones for Ericsson.

Flextronics was responsible for the design and manufacture of the XBox, but it had to work closely with Microsoft employees who helped dictate the Xbox's look and feel as well as when and how it would ship. Collaboration is necessary to avoid having customers decide too late in the process that they don't like the product Flextronics has built, says Malcolm Smith, Flextronics' VP of product design and engineering. "By the time the customer sees it, it's too late to implement real changes," Smith says. "Collaboration lets you make changes sooner."

With 70,000 employees and 2,000 design engineers around the world, Flextronics relies on teleconferencing systems and online programs such as NetMeeting to marshal its own resources. It uses software from CoCreate Software called OneSpace to let engineers in its Singapore offices work with someone in Sweden about antenna design by swapping information in a Web-based workspace.

Next, Flextronics wants a system to gather knowledge throughout the company. It's building a custom application, FlexDesign, that compiles company rules about design and components so engineers who choose components will consider business and technical reasons. They may include such factors as whether it's from an approved supplier or whether it's been tested elsewhere in the company. A simi-lar program will analyze completed circuit boards to see if they're laid out correctly.