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DPMO

The document discusses defects per unit (DPU), defects per opportunity (DPO), and defects per million opportunities (DPMO) which are metrics used in Six Sigma. It provides examples of calculating DPMO using data from a bottling company that was addressing issues with loose bottle caps. DPMO allows companies to determine defects within their manufacturing processes.

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umesh pradhan
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28 views2 pages

DPMO

The document discusses defects per unit (DPU), defects per opportunity (DPO), and defects per million opportunities (DPMO) which are metrics used in Six Sigma. It provides examples of calculating DPMO using data from a bottling company that was addressing issues with loose bottle caps. DPMO allows companies to determine defects within their manufacturing processes.

Uploaded by

umesh pradhan
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The Six Sigma principle focuses on lowering the number of defects produced by a process.

That is why
understanding metrics related to defects is so important. Defects per Unit (DPU), Defects per
Opportunity (DPO), and Defects per Million Opportunities (DPMO) are the major formula employed in
the Six Sigma technique. DPMO calculates defects per sample or chances of detecting defects in a
million opportunities. “Lean six sigma is generally suited for repetitive tasks for which Six Sigma and Lean
have been seen as improvement in methodologies” (Bertolaccini et al., 2015). This paper explores all the
topics mentioned above.

“Defects per unit (DPU) is a globally used measurement of quality that is calculated by dividing the times
of defects by the number of goods - when there are 50 defects in 1,000 production units, the defect rate
per unit is 0.05” (Bragg, 2022). A DPO calculation is a proportion computation and the proportion of the
number of errors divided by the total of possible chances for a fault to exist. Because it is impossible to
have more chances than events, the consequence will be a value between 0 and 1 and 1. It is the
number of defects in a sample to the total number of defect opportunities. So, the ratio gives a
complete understanding of the median value of defects among the total opportunities the sample group
provides. It gives a clear picture of how often errors occur in a process so that the repetition can be
calculated to formulate a solution.

Even though a million units might be a yardstick for calculating DPMO, it is not necessary to have such
massive production to calculate it. In the case of products under a million units, there is an option of
using either a thousand or a hundred in the section of opportunities used. The flexible number of units
needs the reflection of the exact quantity. A sample of the number of defects when divided by the
overall size of defect opportunities, which is then multiplied by 1 million, gives the DPMO or Defects per
million opportunities. The DPMO calculates the opportunities preset by defects and is a valuable
standard used to juxtapose processes involving contrasting complexities. Behara et al. (1995) attempted
to advertise the DPMO logic by describing a defect as dissatisfaction of a client with each quality
measure, with dissatisfaction defined as a test score of 5 or less on a 1-10 scale. “As a result, DPMO
stands for the percentage of unsatisfied consumers per million customers” (Setijono, 2009).

XYZ bottlers produce billions of bottles for beverages, especially beer. A recent complaint from
consumers was related to the leakage from the bottle, which was related to loose caps of the bottle. XYZ
management was serious about responding to the complaint and ordered an inspection of its
manufacturing process and took a sample of 1000 bottles. The audit team issued an order to sample at
least 1,000 bottles to investigate the issue and report. In their investigation process, it was found that
for various machines used in the process, ten opportunities of loose caps were found in the bottling of
beer bottles. The audit reported 600 bottles with loose caps from the sample picked from different
bottlers. By using the formula of DPMO, the company ascertained that 60,000 opportunities were
available for the bottle to have loose caps in the entire process from all factories. Thus, with the
calculation, the company could resolve the problem. DPMO = [total number of defects in a sample/
(sample size units * opportunities of defects in a sample)] * 1,000,000

[600 / (1,000 x 10)] x 1,000,000 = 60,000

In conclusion, Lean Six Sigma’s role in DPU, DPO, and DPMO has been adequately described for finding
out the defects in the opportunities of a manufacturing cycle. Thus, an example of a bottler company
has made it clear to understand the role of DPMO.
Behara, R.S., Fontenot, G.F., Gresham, A. (1995), “Customer satisfaction measurement and analysis
using six sigma”, International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp. 9-18.

Bertolaccini, L., Viti, A., & Terzi, A. (2015). The Statistical point of view of Quality: the Lean Six Sigma
methodology. Journal of thoracic disease, 7(4), E66–E68. https://doi.org/10.3978/j.issn.2072-
1439.2015.04.11

Bragg, S. (2021). Defects per unit definition. AccountingTools. Retrieved March 13, 2022, from
https://www.accountingtools.com/articles/defects-per-unit.

Setijono, D. (2009). The application of modified “Defect Per Million Opportunities” (DPMO) and sigma
level to measure service effectiveness. International Journal of Six Sigma and Competitive Advantage,
5(2), 173. https://doi.org/10.1504/ijssca.2009.025168

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