Fabrinet, a contract manufacturer with more than 5,000 employees at factories in Thailand, China and the United States, defines "sustainable processes" as those that boast environmental benefits and boost profits, cut costs and provide a competitive advantage. The company specializes in optical and electromechanical components and bulk optics for the communications, telecommunications and medical industries.

In addition to employing value-stream mapping to reduce internal waste, Fabrinet uses a methodology that it calls "green-stream mapping" to identify opportunities to make its manufacturing and business processes more sustainable. Chief Operating Officer Harpal Gill explains that those opportunities might include choosing to use a molding process rather than a machining process to save energy and minimize scrap; redesigning packaging to accommodate more items per tray; shipping full pallets versus half pallets; and using electronic documentation methods in lieu of paper-based documentation.

When Fabrinet incorporates such sustainability-driven processes into its proposals for manufacturing projects, customers tend to be receptive, according to Gill.

"Typically the feedback is very good," Gill says. "The ROI for them is instant, because most of the time they don't have to invest any money. I mean, if we go paperless and develop the process, they're only too happy to see it done."

Harpal Gill, Chief Operating Officer, Fabrinet

A big part of Fabrinet's push to become a green manufacturer has been its initiatives to reduce paper and energy consumption. Fabrinet estimates that its efforts to reduce its paper consumption -- the company, through the use of an RFID system, now boasts paperless warehouses -- saved 3.5 million sheets of paper in fiscal year 2008. Meanwhile, the company calculates that it saved approximately 6.6 million kilowatt-hours of electricity, cut CO₂ emissions from power generation by 4,356 tons and saved $567,000 in electricity costs in fiscal year 2008 through its efforts to reduce electricity consumption. (The entire top floor of Fabrinet's newest facility, in Patumthanee, Thailand, is illuminated by natural lighting and uses no electric lights during daylight hours.)

"Not a bad deal: You eliminate CO₂ by 4,356 tons and still save half a million dollars," Gill says.

Nabil Nasr, director of the Golisano Institute for Sustainability at the Rochester Institute of Technology, which offers a Ph.D. focusing on sustainable production systems, believes that manufacturers that implement sustainable processes position themselves to be market leaders.

"We see sustainability as a key competitive advantage," Nasr says. "If companies are able to figure out a way to make the same product with less material, less energy consumption and less emission, they'll be far more competitive than others.

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