In today’s global and competitive markets selling products at competitive prices, coordination of supply chain configuration, and environmental and ecological consciousness and responsibility become important issues for all companies around the world. The price of products is affected by costs, one of which is inventory cost. Inventory does not give any added value to products but must be kept in order to fulfill the customer demand in time. Therefore, this cost must be kept at the minimum level. In order to reduce the amount of inventory across a supply chain, coordination of decisions among all players in the chain is necessary. Coordination is needed not only for a two-level supply chain involving a manufacturer and its customers, but also for a complex supply chain of multiple tiers involving many players. With increasing attention being placed to environmental and ecological consciousness and responsibility, companies are keen to have a reverse supply chain where used products are collected and usable components remanufactured and reused in production to minimize negative impacts on the environment, adding further complexity to decision making across a supply chain. To deal with the above issues, this thesis proposes and develops the mathematical models and solution methods for coordinating the production inventory system in a complex manufacturing supply chain involving reverse logistics and multiple products. The supply chain consists of tier-2 suppliers for raw materials, tier-1 suppliers for parts, a manufacturer who manufactures and assembles parts into finished products, distributors, retailers and a third party who collects the used products and returns usable parts to the system. The models consider a limited contract period among all players, capacity constraints in transportation units and stochastic demand. The solution methods for solving the models are proposed based on decentralized, semi-centralized and centralized decision making processes. Numerical examples are used by adopting data from the literature to demonstrate, test, analyse and discuss the models. The results show that centralised decision making process is the best way to coordinate all players in the supply chain which minimise total cost of the supply chain as a whole. The results also show that the selection of the length of limited horizon/ contract period will be one of the main factors which will determine the type of coordination (decentralised, centralised or semi-centralised) among all players in the supply chain. We also found that the models developed can be viewed as generalised models for multi-level supply chain by examining the models using systems of different tiers from the literature. We conclude that the models are insensitive to changes of input parameters since percentage changes of the supply chain’s total cost are less than percentage changes of input parameters for the scenarios studied.

Autor no autoriza el acceso a texto completo de su documento hasta el 04/12/2019. / Ingeniero Civil Industrial / El presente trabajo de memoria se desarrolló en la empresa Procter & Gamble, dentro el área de logística, específicamente en el marco del suministro de Desodorantes y Anti-Transpirantes producidos y distribuidos por la multinacional. El trabajo consta de un análisis cuantitativo del funcionamiento de una de las plantas productoras de los ya mencionados bienes, la cual alimenta parte de las cadenas de suministro de los mercados de Latinoamérica. A partir de este análisis se realiza un diagnóstico del desempeño de dicha planta en cuanto al manejo de inventarios y al nivel de servicio, todo respecto al producto terminado de la planta, además de un profundo estudio de la demanda, para analizar la capacidad de la planta en estudio a mediano/largo plazo. El objetivo principal de esta memoria es conseguir una mayor eficiencia en cuanto a los niveles de inventarios de producto terminado, sin ir en desmedro del nivel de servicio. Para esto, se realiza un levantamiento del proceso productivo de la planta, lo que permite generar un diagnóstico e identificar las oportunidades de mejora, en las cuales se basa la propuesta de solución, centrada en una reducción de los inventarios de seguridad de cada producto a través de una simulación computacional. Los resultados obtenidos apuntan a una reducción cercana al 9% en los niveles de inventarios de seguridad asociados a los productos originados en la planta, lo cual representa un ahorro estimado de los costos de almacenamiento cercano a los USD$450 mil anuales. Se concluye también sobre el horizonte para el cual la planta podría funcionar sin inconvenientes de capacidad en cada una de sus líneas productivas.

Today’s dynamic and increasingly competitive market had expanded complexities for global businesses pressuring companies to start leveraging on Big Data solutions in order to sustain the global competitions by becoming more data-driven in managing their supply chains.The main purpose of this study is twofold, 1) to explore the implications of applying analytics designing supply chain networks, 2) to investigate the link between operational and strategic management levels when making strategic decisions using Analytics.Qualitative methods have been applied for this study to gain a greater understanding of the Supply Chain Analytics phenomenon. An inductive approach in form of interviews, was performed in order to gain new empirical data. Fifteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with professional individuals who hold managerial roles such as project managers, consultants, and end-users within the fields of Supply Chain Management and Big Data Analytics. The received empirical information was later analyzed using the thematic analysis method.The main findings in this thesis relatively contradicts with previous studies and existing literature in terms of connotations, definitions and applications of the three main types of Analytics. Furthermore, the findings present new approaches and perspectives that advanced analytics apply on both strategic and operational management levels that are shaping supply chain network designs.

Falsified and substandard drugs are classified as a global problem and continue to increase as manufacturing becomes globalized and the complexity of distribution systems expands. The falsified and substandard drugs come with major health risks and socioeconomic consequences. The pharmaceutical supply chain is handled by several parties, making it harder to detect when falsified and substandard drugs end up in distribution. Since the rise of the cryptocurrency bitcoin, blockchain technology has been recognized for its transparency and security. Previous research describes blockchain as a decentralized database structure that preserves a chronological chain of blocks where each block contains a registered valid network activity verified by consensus of the participants in the network. The purpose of this study is to create a broader understanding of how blockchain can improve the transparency and traceability of the pharmaceutical supply chain in order to reduce the incidence of falsified and substandard drugs. The study is based on a qualitative method in the form of five semi-structured interviews with representatives from the pharmaceutical industry and two blockchain companies. In the study's discussion section, the literature study is set against the collected empirical material. Two tables also illustrate how the pharmaceutical industry is working with traceability and what effects blockchain can provide a supply chain. Finally, the study notes that regulations on the pharmaceutical industry primarily control which database structure is implemented on the supply chain. It is also stated that blockchain has characteristics that can improve transparency and traceability of a supply chain, but the technology is to some extent limited mainly by its large need for capacity

Disruptions in the supply chain are becoming more common as supply chains become more complex, and supply chain managers of warehouse distribution centers need strategies to minimize the impact of disruptions. In this study, the focus of the research questions was on strategies supply chain managers could use to mitigate the impact of disruptions. The conceptual frameworks for this study were the resource dependence theory and the normal accident theory, which link supply chain disruptions with resource availability and the inability to eliminate disruptions. An exploratory case study involved exploring how supply chain managers of a warehouse distribution center in Jacksonville, Florida, successfully used strategies to mitigate the impact of a disruption after it occurred. Data came from responses to semistructured interview questions from these managers (n = 6) and archival documents related to policies, procedures, and business continuity planning of a warehouse distribution center in Jacksonville, Florida. I analyzed the data by using Atlas.ti qualitative analysis software. There were 6 themes that emerged: collaborating to minimize the impact of disruptions, disruptions precursors, identifying and assessing impact of disruptions, resources used to minimize impact of disruption, strategies to mitigate disruptions, and supplier relationships. The results could contribute to social change by minimizing the negative effects disruptions have on an organization's profitability and performance. Social change can come from business leaders who are able to maintain and sustain their businesses after a supply chain disruption has occurred.

As adaptive clinical trials (ACTs) receive growing attention and exhibit promising performance in practical trials during last decade, they also present challenges to drug supply chain management. As indicated by Burnham et al. (2015), the challenges include the uncertainty of maximum drug supply needed, the shifting of supply requirement, and rapid availability of new supply at decision points. To facilitate drug supply decision making and the development of mathematical analysis tools, we propose two trial supply chain optimization problems that represent different mindsets in response to trial adaptations. In the first problem, we treat the impacts of ACTs as exogenous uncertainties and study important aspects of trial supply, including drug wastage, resupply policy, trial length, and costs minimization, via a two-stage stochastic program. In the second problem, we incorporate the adaptation rules of ACTs with supply chain management and numerically study the impact of joint optimization on the trial and drug supply planning through a mixed-integer nonlinear program (MINLP). For solution approaches to the problems, we use progressive hedging algorithm (PHA) and particle swarm optimization (PSO) respectively, and take advantages of the problem structures to enhance the solution efficiency. With case studies, we see that the proposed models capture the features of ACT drug supply and the mechanisms of trial conduction well. The solutions not only reflect the impact of trial adaptations but also provide managerial suggestions, e.g. the prediction of needed production amount, storage capacity at clinical sites, and resupply schemes. The joint optimization also suggests a new angle and research extension in the field of ACT design and supply.

Supply chain disruptions are more prevalent in Ghana as businesses develop and become more complex. While business leaders recognize the importance of reducing the exposure to disruptions, 83 % of companies still suffer a form of disruption. Using the systems theory as the conceptual framework, the purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore strategies supply chain managers in Ghana use to reduce disruptions in the supply chain. The data collection was through face-to-face, semi-structured interviews from 12 supply chain managers who gave tape-recorded interview responses to 8 questions. Transcript evaluation, member checking, and methodological triangulation ensured reliability and strengthened the credibility of the data collected. Data analysis revealed 6 themes, which included identification of disruptions before they occur, information sharing and collaboration between partners, management strategies to mitigate supply chain disruptions, inventory optimization, availability of human capital, energy, and finance problems. The identification of disruptions was important to participants because they believed if they identified potential disruptions they might prevent them from happening. The collaboration between partners was important because participants believed that the speed at which stakeholders work together after a disruption determines the extent of the cost and the recovery period. Business leaders could apply the findings to provide insight to businesses to reduce disruptions, improve best practices, and increase business profits. Implications for social change include the enhancement of company profits given efficiencies in the supply chain. Such increase in profits leads to increases in taxes, which contributes to the overall betterment of the local communities.

This thesis studies the influence of horizontal competition on supply chain performance. Unlike most of the existing literature which focuses on horizontal competition between echelon levels, we look at both the supply chain and the individual company??s performance with the presence of supply chain to supply chain competition. Specifically, this thesis is composed of three individual research papers. The first paper deals with chain-to-chain horizontal competition and considers price competition among an arbitrary number of supply chains by comparing two cases. In the first case each supply chain is vertically integrated, while in the second, decentralised, case the manufacturers and retailers act independently. We explore the effect of varying the level of price competition on the profitts of the industry participants and demonstrate the important role played by the spread of underlying market shares. The coefficient of variation of these market shares determines whether decentralised supply chains can outperform integrated supply chains with an appropriate level of competition. The second and third papers focus on in-chain horizontal competition with capacity constraints. In the second paper, we look at a supply chain with one manufacturer and two downstream retailers. Based on total capacity available, the manufacturer needs to find ways to best use the capacity by determining whether or not to release the capacity information to retailers. The third paper looks at competition in a more complicated supply chain structure. A retailer buys three brands of products from two manufacturers. One manufacturer produces both branded and private label products, and the other one manufactures a branded product only. With our model, we are able to determine the profits of each supply chain agent. At the end of the paper, we use data from the Australian milk industry and discuss a problem in which a manufacturer needs to decide how to allocate capacity between the national brand and the private label when there is a capacity shortage.

Zugl.: Duisburg, Essen, Univ., Diss., 2006

<p> </p><p>Saab Microwave Systems (SMW) is a business unit within Saab AB that manufactures and develops different types of radar- and sensor systems for naval, airborne and ground based forces as well as within the market for civil security. In addition to the manufacturing of radar and sensor systems they also provide different types of service concepts. The business unit has 50 years of experience within the area of developing radar systems and is considered to be one of the market leaders. When applying an assemble-to-order production strategy with products at this level of cost price the product lead-time is vital and becomes an important part of the strategy within marketing and sales.</p><p> </p><p>Within SMW there is a new department called Supply Management (SM) that provides the supply of incoming and outgoing material. Within SM there are four sub-departments working with activities such as planning, purchasing, receiving inspection, storage and distribution. Today, the supply process is relatively inefficient and there are delays in the flow due to suddenly arising problems. These delays generate big problems since SMW applies a just-in-time purchasing strategy. Based upon this problem the major purpose of this thesis work is to perform an analysis of the material flow in order to identify problems and contribute to a more efficient supply process.</p><p> </p><p>When the problems were identified the authors in consultation with the management choose to give priority to one problem in order to have a more finite focus regarding the analysis. The most serious problem that are given priority to is the receiving inspection since there is a lack of proper measurements, the planning is inadequate, the level of inspection is to high as well as uncontrolled, the inspections are based upon subjective appraisals and there is a lack of storage space. Within this problem there will be an extra focus upon the level of inspection even though the other problems will be given thought as well. When this problem was chosen as the main area of focus the authors took the level of importance and usefulness for the company into consideration, what came up during the analysis of the material flow as well as what the authors considered to be the best area of focus given existing conditions.</p><p> </p><p>The suggested improvements presented by the authors mainly consist of two areas regarding the level of inspection. The first suggestion consists of a filtering model that through a set of parameters are able to decide whether a specific article should be going through a reduced level of inspection or not. The second suggestion consists of a model that the company could use when they are phasing in new suppliers or improving existing ones. The purpose of this model is to create a close collaboration between important suppliers and SMW in order to reach a higher level of quality on the incoming material. The reason to why this model is created is due to the fact that the company has a very high level of inspection regarding incoming material today since the quality in many cases is faulty. By using this model the authors' ambition is to reduce the risk of defectives reaching SMW by supplier collaboration and this way oppose defectives earlier in the material flow. In addition to these suggested improvements the authors also suggest some thoughts and ideas regarding what is needed to be taken into consideration in order to reach a better planning and how the work efficiency within the receiving inspection department can be improved.</p> / <p> </p><p>Saab Microwave Systems (SMW) är en affärsenhet inom Saab AB och de tillverkar och utvecklar idag olika typer av radarsystem för luftfart, markbaserade enheter samt inom det marina. Företaget tillverkar och utvecklar även radarsystem inom marknaden för civil säkerhet. Vid sidan av tillverkningen av radar- och sensorsystem erbjuder företaget även intilliggande servicekoncept och eftermarknadsservice. Enheten har 50 års gedigen erfarenhet inom området radarutveckling och är ett ledande företag på marknaden. Med en kundorderstyrd produktion av produkter i denna höga prisklass blir ledtid en viktig del av marknadsföring och försäljningsargumentation vilket innebär att materialförsörjningen är vital för framgång.</p><p> </p><p>Inom SMW finns idag en nybildad enhet, Supply Management (SM), som ombesörjer materialförsörjningen av gods till och från SMW. Inom denna enhet finns fyra undergrupperingar; planering, operativt inköp, ankomstkontroll och förråd samt godsmottagning och spedition. I dagsläget fungerar inte materialförsörjningen som önskat utan det uppstår ofta brister och förseningar i flödet, något som skapar stora problem då SMW i så hög utsträckning som möjligt försöker tillämpa inköpsstrategin just-in-time. Med hänsyn till detta är examensarbetets främsta uppgift att göra en flödesanalys i syfte att identifiera brister och effektivisera materialförsörjningen.</p><p> </p><p>Efter att ha presenterat en bristidentifiering, baserad på en flödeskartläggning, har författarna i samråd med ledningsgruppen för enheten Supply Management valt att prioritera en brist för att ha ett konkret fokusområde för arbetet med analys och förbättringsförslag. Den allvarligaste bristen som prioriteras för vidare arbete är en ineffektiv ankomstkontroll där det saknas vettiga nyckeltal och verksamhetsmätning, där planering och resurssättning sker utifrån osäkra data, kontrollomfattningen är hög och okontrollerad, kontrollerna baseras på subjektiva bedömningar samtidigt som det råder utrymmesbrist i lager och förråd.  Inom denna brist läggs extra fokus på kontrollomfattningen även om övriga problemområden också tas i beaktning i ett vidare arbete. När fokusområde valdes togs hänsyn till vad som framkom i bristidentifieringen, vad som var viktigast och mest kritiskt för SMW samt vad författarna ansåg sig kunna prestera utifrån gällande förutsättningar.</p><p> </p><p>Författarnas förbättringsförslag består främst av två huvudområden kopplade till kontrollomfattningen. För det första presenteras en filtreringsmodell som genom ett antal parametrar sorterar artiklar efter huruvida de bedöms kunna genomgå en lättare (billigare och mindre resurskrävande) kontroll eller inte. Det andra förslaget är en modell för hur företaget kan arbeta när de fasar in nya och/eller utvecklar utvalda leverantörer med hög inverkan i syfte att skapa ett nära samarbete där högre kvalitet kan uppnås. Syftet med framtagning av modellen samt dess utformning grundar sig i att kontrollomfattningen som utförs på SMW är kopplad till inkommande kvalitet. Utifrån detta perspektiv vill författarna genom denna modell reducera riskerna för dålig inkommande kvalitet tidigare i materialflödet genom ett organiserat samarbete. I tillägg till dessa förslag presenteras även idéer och tankar på vad som bör tas i beaktning för att kunna uppnå en bättre och mer sanningsenlig planering samt hur arbetseffektiviteten kan höjas genom att tillsätta en administrativ- och teknisk roll på ankomstkontrollen.</p>