means a manufacturing method where a product moves past stationary workers, each adding one part in sequence, until it emerges finished, fast, and identical to the last one.

from henry ford didn't invent it, he stole it from chicago slaughterhouses, where disassembly lines butchered hogs in reverse. ford flipped the logic in 1913: instead of taking a thing apart step by step, build one that way, and car production time dropped from 12 hours to 93 minutes.