What a plant manufacturing lenses should do, in a nutshell, is accurately create each form (product) based on the drawings designed and the numerical values specified, as well as polish the lens elements, produce lens components, and assemble them accurately. This may sound simple enough, but is actually very difficult to execute, with the plant assuming enormous responsibilities.
   At the risk of going a little too far, you could even say that what determines the quality of Tamron’s interchangeable lenses is ultimately the technical skills and knowhow (the level of manufacturing techniques) of its plants.

   However superb a product design may be, unless the plant personnel can achieve the levels expected by the designers, that is to say, unless the plant workers can engage in manufacturing just as specified in the design drawings and can accurately carry out the assembly, creating a product is simply not possible.
   At the same time, while manufacturing operations that meet the design target values is the minimum requirement for a plant, receiving a design drawing does not mean that you can start manufacturing the product right off the bat.
   Before full-scale production at a plant can start, trial production is repeatedly carried out, with inspections by the QA & QC Department, and the personnel of the Production Engineering Department and the relevant plant hold discussions, prepare and adjust the necessary manufacturing equipment, and determine efficient lens manufacturing methods that will ensure consistent quality, finally leading to production start-up.

   With Tamron’s lens manufacturing plant in Foshan, China actively incorporating advanced production equipment and measures for improving productivity and production characteristics, I will now guide you on a tour of its sites that actually create the lenses, and we will take a look at what underpins Tamron’s manufacturing, quality and technological strengths.
 

   Tamron’s plant in China is located in Foshan City, which lies about 30 km south of Guangzhou City, Guangdong Province. Foshan is a large city with a population of about 7.4 million people, including those working away from their homes in rural areas. The name Foshan (“Buddha Mountain”) can be traced to the fact that in the mid-7th century, three Buddhist statues were discovered in the area. It was traditionally an area known for its pottery, but in more recent years, it has continued to grow as a large city centered on industrial technologies.

   The formal name of Tamron’s Chinese plant is Tamron Optical (Foshan) Co., Ltd.
   Established in 1997, the plant commenced operations in 1998, so it has now been in existence for close to 20 years. The current number of employees is approximately 3,000, with a relatively young average age of 26.3 years old. Many of the departments run a 24-hour operation each day.

   For employees working away from their homes in rural areas, there is a company dormitory built on the plant premises, with up to about 1,000 people able to live in the dormitory. I understand that the employee-only cafeteria serves meals four times a day: breakfast, lunch and supper, and also late at night.
   Some employees jointly rent and live together in apartment buildings with friends and colleagues. A lot of assistance is given to the employees by the company, which provides subsidies for food and dormitory expenses and apartment rents. I understand that, in comparison with other plants in China, the turnover is low at the Tamron plant, which has many veteran workers with over 15 years’ service.
 

   Tamron currently has a total of six plants in Japan and overseas.
   The Mold Technology Center in the Tamron Head Office in Saitama City, Saitama Prefecture produces metal molds, and Tamron has three other plants in Japan, in Aomori Prefecture in Northern Japan. The Hirosaki plant performs metal parts processing and lens assembly, the Namioka plant is in charge of grinding and polishing spherical lens elements and manufacturing aspherical glass lens elements, and the Owani plant produces molded plastic parts. The two plants overseas comprise the Tamron plant in Foshan, China and the Tamron plant in Hanoi, Vietnam, with the latter established in 2013.

   The Tamron plant in Foshan, China has a mostly integrated production structure within one plant, carrying out lens grinding, polishing and production; lens molding and coating; the printing of the nameplates on lens barrels; the processing of metal parts; lens assembly; the packing of complete products; and shipments.

   There are, however, some parts that are not currently produced at the Tamron plant in Foshan, including electronic components (AF and VC unit modules and electronic substrates), the metal molds used for plastic molding that are fabricated at the plant inside the Saitama Head Office, and the aspherical glass (GM) lens elements and special lenses with nano-structured eBAND coating, etc. that are supplied from the Namioka plant in Aomori. Some packing materials and printed boxes are produced at supplier plants around Foshan City.
 

   As readers may be well aware, Tamron Co., Ltd. is not a manufacturer that produces only interchangeable lenses. The production of interchangeable lenses for cameras naturally accounts for a large part of its overall business, and the company also engages in OEM production (production commissioned by another manufacturer under its brand) for the interchangeable lenses of other manufacturers.
   Tamron also produces lens units for point & shoot digital cameras and video cameras. Tamron is actually a leading manufacturer of optics for diverse applications, which also produces lenses of its own design for surveillance systems and automotive applications, among other industrial products.

   By developing, designing and manufacturing advanced optical products other than interchangeable lenses, Tamron has, in some instances, applied the new technologies and manufacturing knowhow it has cultivated and obtained in these areas to the design and production of new interchangeable lenses.

   The Tamron plant in Foshan currently produces about eight types of interchangeable lens products. For some lenses, after lens production at the Namioka plant and lens assembly at the Hirosaki plant, which are both in Aomori, continues for a certain period, the assembly line operations are almost fully transferred to Tamron’s Foshan plant, which then continues manufacturing these lenses. They include the SP 24-70mm F/2.8 Di VC USD (Model A007) and 28-300mm F/3.5-6.3 Di VC PZD (Model A010).
   Tamron positions its three plants in Aomori as the “mother plants.” Each with a long history of lens-making, these plants have a lot of veteran workers with outstanding skills, knowhow and knowledge regarding lens manufacturing and production lines.
 

   A common approach adopted has been to first start production at one of the mother plants in Aomori, and if any problems are identified there, they are corrected and improvements are made. After stable and consistent manufacturing operations are firmly in place, they are then transferred to the Tamron plant in Foshan.
   The system of transferring the production line operations from a mother plant(s) in Aomori to the Tamron plant in Foshan has been occurring for quite a while, but the level of production engineering has gradually risen at the Foshan plant, with the overall growth of the Foshan plant meaning that they are now close to being on a par with the mother plants in Aomori.

   Clearly attesting to this growth is the fact that for the latest SP 85mm F/1.8 Di VC USD (Model F016), SP 150-600mm F/5-6.3 Di VC USD (Model A011) and SP 150-600mm F/5-6.3 Di VC USD G2 (Model A022), it became possible, without going through any of the mother plants, to immediately commence mass production at Tamron’s Foshan plant. This shows that the Foshan plant is now recognized throughout the group as having that level of capability.
   Thanks to the years of guidance provided by the personnel at the mother plants in Aomori, the Tamron plant in Foshan has mostly become independent and self-reliant, and has grown to such a level that it is able to serve as the mother plant for Tamron’s plant in Vietnam.

   In the next blog in this series, I would like to take a look, along with you readers, at the processes of how the interchangeable lenses are assembled and undergo numerous inspections until they are shipped from the Tamron plant in Foshan.