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A high level of delivery precision from a focal firm to their customers has the potential to provide competitive advantage amongst competing businesses. This report will detail the subject of inventory management and utilize theories on the subject in order to provide recommendations to a multinational company that wishes to increase their delivery precision. The results of the work conducted are presented and recommendations given in the form of firstly analyzing inventory and segregating the product range where applicable. This should be treated as the first priority to gain an insight into where potential problem areas lie and to determine the products that are the biggest contributors to the overall value of goods sold. As a secondary measure, managing supplier relations carefully and the strategic sourcing of materials are strategies that will help to effectively reduce problems through increased visibility of information in communication channels. An accurate demand forecasting model will predict demand ahead of time, ensuring that the correct products are being held as inventory for no longer than is strictly needed, with a safety stock system being used as a safety net for those products that are suitable. A theoretical implementation of exponential II smoothing based forecasting coupled with standard deviation based safety stock calculations, yields results that effectively raises delivery precision. By forecasting demand for individual months and using calculated safety stock levels, the model is able to adjust for the shortfall between forecasted demand and actual demand.

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how to decrease lead-times of conventionally manufactured prototypes of tools and fixtures. Which could lead to increased knowledge of how an operations site within the automotive industry could utilize additive manufacturing when producing company specific prototypes of tools and fixtures.  The research approach applied in this case study combines a literature review to systematically find relevant literature aligned with the research topic of additive manufacturing or 3D printing related to lead-time reduction and generative design terms. With the help of interviews and observations profound knowledge was gained as preparation before continuing the research. Thereafter, a pre-study was conducted in order to further enhance the understanding of the industrial context of the two chosen fixtures (study objects). Rapid prototyping activities with additive manufacturing processes and technologies of experimentation character was conducted iteratively with both 3D CAD and 3D printing software and hardware. Analysis of the data was conducted through a comparison between lead-times of conventionally manufactured and 3D printed prototypes of the two chosen fixtures. Moreover, identifying potential effects with additive manufacturing of prototypes have with a SWOT analysis.  The case study found that additive manufacturing could significantly decrease lead-times when producing prototypes compared to conventional manufacturing. Furthermore, the results showed that the effects of additive manufacturing are plenty and rather complex due to the fact of this new way to manufacture prototypes. Therefore, the term design for additive manufacturing need first class priority if next steps were to be taken in the additive manufacturing field to enhance industrial and academic benefits.  The research on this subject is strongly constrained by the scarcity of empirical experience and, consequently, by the scarcity of available empirical data. Research publication on the topic are fruitful and plenty but their findings specified to their chosen study objects. This case study gives an up-to-date contribution to the topic of additive manufacturing with endless possibilities to reduce lead-time with rapid prototyping activities that utilizes additive manufacturing. Moreover, the research approach used in this thesis combines 3D CAD data through theoretical concepts and physical objects with additive manufacturing practice. Overall, the results can be used to improve academic research in the topic and promote discussion among different actors entering or within the additive manufacturing field.

This report shows the value of knowing your processes inside a company. The methods used in to do this have been first of all through process mapping and for in depth study, process cards were used to measure the process time and total lead time. This showed the location of bottlenecks and overall process capacity. With the data collected, suggestion on how to decrease storage, throughput time and total lead time is given.The study has been conducted at Intelbras in San Jose, Santa Catarina, Brazil. Intelbras is a telecommunication company which produces telephones, security cameras and switchboards. Two production processes is studied, the Telefone Sem fio, SFL, which produce cordless telephones and Central, CAL, which produce switchboards.Through simulation this paper shows improvement suggestions on how to better handle the flow of material by introducing sequencing into the production and FIFO in the storage handling, everything in order to decrease total lead time and increasing throughput time.Process mapping has proved to be a great tool in order to understand how a production process works and integrates with other departments. In supplement of process cards, valuable data is collected and used for analysing further improvements such as making a balancing program and calculating where and how big buffers is needed at different processes. / Program: Industriell ekonomi - arbetsorganisation och ledarskap

Le CHC est souvent diagnostiqué à un stade avancé, stade où les options thérapeutiques sont limitées et le plus souvent palliatives. A l’inverse, les patients diagnostiqués à un stade précoce sont candidats à des traitements curatifs tels que la résection chirurgicale, la radiofréquence et la transplantation hépatique. Le dépistage par échographie des cirrhotiques (surveillance tous les 6 mois) est recommandé par la grande majorité d’experts et les sociétés savantes afin de détecter et traiter le CHC à un stade précoce. Cependant, l’impact du dépistage sur la survie des patients reste controversé en raison des insuffisances méthodologiques des études l’ayant évalué. Parmi les incertitudes méthodologiques, le biais d’avance au diagnostic, qui correspond à un allongement du temps de suivi du à un dépistage plus précoce, n’a le plus souvent pas été pris en compte dans les études ayant évalué l’impact du dépistage. L’approche par modélisation est une option attractive pour l’évaluation du dépistage car la réalisation d’un essai randomisé contrôlé comparant les malades dépistés et non dépistés est irréalisable pour des raisons d’ordre éthique. Dans ce travail, nous avons développé un modèle de la progression du CHC de la date de diagnostic jusqu’au décès. Ce modèle prend en compte l’âge des patients, la connaissance du statut VHC et les principaux facteurs pronostiques du CHC sur cirrhose virale C compensée et décompensée. Il a été alimenté par plusieurs types de données pour fixer les probabilités de transitions dans le modèle, et valider les sorties du modèle. Dans un premier temps, afin d’éviter une surestimation du bénéfice du dépistage, il a été indispensable de calculer le biais d’avance au diagnostic et de l’intégrer dans le calcul de la survie des patients dépistés. Dans un deuxième temps le modèle a évalué l’impact du dépistage du CHC chez les patients ayant une cirrhose virale C compensée et connaissant leur statut VHC. Dans un contexte de cirrhose compensée avec un statut VHC-connu, notre étude montre que le dépistage du CHC réalisé dans la pratique courante (taux d’accès au dépistage = 57%, une efficacité du dépistage correspondant à 42% des patients diagnostiqués à un stade précoce) améliore la survie des patients, avec une augmentation de l’espérance de vie (EV) de 11 mois et une diminution de risque de décès à 5 ans de 6% par rapport à l’absence du dépistage (taux d’accès au dépistage = 0%, 19% des patients non dépistés pour le CHC sont diagnostiqués à un stade précoce). Elle souligne l’importance des deux variables, taux d’accès au dépistage et efficacité du dépistage, sur la survie des patients. Par rapport au dépistage réalisé dans la pratique courante : a) un scénario d’augmentation du taux d’accès au dépistage de 57% à 97% augmente l’EV de 7 mois et diminue le risque de décès à 5 ans de 5% ; b) un scénario d’augmentation de l’efficacité du dépistage de 42% à 87% (dépistage optimal) augmente l’EV de 14 mois et diminue le risque de décès à 5 ans de 9% ; c) un scénario combinant une augmentation de l’efficacité du dépistage à 87% et une augmentation du taux d’accès au dépistage à 97% augmente l’EV de 31 mois et diminue le risque de décès à 5 ans de 20%. Cette étude souligne la nécessité d’une application stricte des modalités de dépistage du CHC, afin d’optimiser son efficacité à diagnostiquer le CHC au stade précoce. Ce travail suggère que les experts devraient cibler leurs recommandations sur l’efficacité du dépistage. De telles recommandations pourraient conduire à discuter de l’expérience et de la qualification des opérateurs et de la qualité du parc des échographes utilisés pour homogénéiser la qualité du dépistage. Finalement, nous avons observé dans un travail préliminaire que le choix optimal de la méthode de correction pour le calcul du biais d’avance au diagnostic devrait prendre en compte la progression tumorale d’un stade asymptomatique vers un stade symptomatique qui diffère d’un cancer à l’autre. / HCC is often diagnosed at an advanced stage, the stage where therapeutic options are limited and mostly palliative. In contrast, the patients who are diagnosed at an earlier stage are candidates for curative treatments such as surgical resection, radiofrequency and liver transplantation. The screening of cirrhotic patients by ultrasound (every 6 months) is recommended by a large majority of experts and specialized societies to detect and treat HCC at an early stage. However, the impact of screening on patients’ survival remains controversial due to its evaluation by the methodological shortcomings of studies. Among the methodological uncertainties, the lead-time bias which corresponds to an extension of the follow-up time which is due to an earlier screening has not often been taken into account in studies that evaluated the impact of screening. The modeling approach is an attractive option for the evaluation of screening because the performance of a randomized controlled trial comparing the screened and the unscreened patients is impossible for ethical reasons. In this work, we developed a model of HCC progression from the date of diagnosis until death. This model takes into account the patient\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'s age, the awareness of HCV-status and the main prognostic factors for HCC in compensated and decompensated cirrhosis due to HCV. The model was supplied by several types of data to set the probabilities of transitions in it and validate its output. In the first step, in order to avoid an overestimation of the benefit of screening, it was necessary to calculate the lead-time bias and to include it in the calculation of the survival of screened patients. In a second step, the model evaluated the impact of screening for HCC in patients with compensated HCV-related cirrhosis and aware of their HCV-status. In the context of compensated cirrhosis with known HCV-status, our study showed that HCC screening performed in currently existing practices (rate of access to screening = 57%; effectiveness of screening corresponding to 42% of patients diagnosed at an early stage) improves the survival of patients with HCC, with an increase in life expectancy (LE) of 11 months and reduced HCC mortality at 5 years by 6% compared to the absence of screening (rate of access to screening = 0%; 19% of patients who had not been screened for HCC are diagnosed at an early stage). It showed the importance of the two variables, the rates of access to HCC screening and the effectiveness of screening on the survival of patients. Regarding the screening performed in currently existing practices: a) a scenario of increase of the rate of access to HCC screening from 57% to 97% which increases the LE by 7 months and reduces HCC mortality at 5 years by 5%; b) a scenario of increase of the effectiveness of HCC screening from 42% to 87% corresponding to that observed in the randomized trial CHC-2000 (optimal screening) which increases the LE by 14 months and reduces mortality at 5 years by 9%; c) a scenario combining an increase of the effectiveness of HCC screening from 42% to 87% and an increase of the rate of access to HCC screening from 57% to 97% which increases the LE by 31 months and reduces mortality at 5 years by 20%. This study emphasizes the need for strict application of rules of HCC screening in order to optimize its effectiveness to diagnose HCC at an early stage. This work suggests that experts should focus their recommendations on the effectiveness of screening. Such recommendations could lead to discuss the experience and qualification of operators and the quality of the park ultrasound used to standardize homogenize the quality of screening. Finally, we observed in a preliminary work that the optimal choice of the correction method for calculating the lead time bias should take into account the tumor progression from an asymptomatic stage to a symptomatic stage, which differs from a cancer to another.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-12T17:36:47Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 arquivo2144_1.pdf: 3689249 bytes, checksum: 7378f3faccd343c4b89312617b63f1a6 (MD5) license.txt: 1748 bytes, checksum: 8a4605be74aa9ea9d79846c1fba20a33 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010 / As empresas utilizam diferentes sistemas de produção, tipos de processos produtivos e leiautes, mas todas estão sempre em busca de reduzir os custos. Para isso, utilizam muitas ferramentas de gestão, muitas delas de origem japonesas, como o Mapeamento do Fluxo de Valor (MFV) e o sistema kanban. Este trabalho tem o objetivo de descrever e classificar os sistemas de produção, os tipos de processos produtivos e de leiaute, apresentar a ferramenta MFV e o sistema kanban e, realizando um estudo de caso, apresentar a aplicação destas ferramentas na prática, de forma a facilitar a utilização das mesmas por gestores. O estudo apresenta uma fábrica com sistema tradicional de produção, um processo em lotes e um leiaute misto, englobando o leiaute funcional e células lineares e funcionais. Foram calculados, para a empresa estudada, um lead time de 68,59 dias, um tempo de processamento de 0,92 segundo, um takt time de 0,66 segundo e uma eficiência de fluxo de 1,78 x 10-5%. Com o desenvolvimento de um de fluxo de valor futuro, obteve-se a redução do lead time para 15,64 dias e o aumento da eficiência de fluxo para 7,84 x 10-5%, o que representa uma melhoria de 338%. O presente trabalho descreve a adaptação da teoria do sistema kanban à prática, apresentando o cálculo utilizado para definição do número de kanbans de produção, o design estabelecido para o cartão, a definição do quadro porta-kanban e o funcionamento do sistema. A pesquisa apresenta as dificuldades encontradas para a realização do MFV e do sistema kanban, pela escassez e dificuldade de levantamento dos dados de produção necessários e mostra a possibilidade de adaptação da teoria à prática, assim como a importância dos profissionais conhecerem as teorias das ferramentas de gestão para melhor aproveitarem o que elas têm a oferecer

<p><strong>Background: </strong>The development of the IT-industry, where new technologies and new services continually arise, has led to new players with different specializations. The increased degree of specialization means that these players need to cooperate with each other in different types of projects.</p><p><strong>Problem definition: </strong>What factors are important in a project to achieve the objectives as quickly as possible? More players should lead to cooperation difficulties, how can you coordinate in the best possible way? Today, it is desirable for all parties in the project to shorten down the lead time.</p><p><strong>Purpose: </strong>The main purpose is to explore the different factors that affects the project's lead time concerning broadband installation. The part purpose, is to analyze and assess the conditions for cooperation between different players in the project for broadband installation and to provide a recommendation.</p><p><strong>Method: </strong>In order to answer the problem definition, the paper is structured around a qualitative approach with interviews to obtain data. Mostly, the used data comes from primary sources with an extension of secondary sources.</p><p><strong>Theories: </strong>Theories that are used in the paper are: Communication Process, Communication Plan, Project Planning & Project Plan, Efficiency through collaboration, Communication in a network.</p><p><strong>Empiric: </strong>Empirical data consists of primary data collected through interviews.</p><p><strong>Analysis:</strong> The analysis is based on the variables from the theoretical frame of reference; Communications, Planning, Interaction & Information. From these variables, empirical data are analyzed in relation to the theory.</p><p><strong>Conclusion:</strong> In the conclusion, the authors discuss about the projects process which is described in the paper. The authors have concluded that; communication, planning and collaboration plays a major role in order to shorten down the lead times for the project. Cooperation beyond enterprise boundaries becomes necessary.</p>

Background: The development of the IT-industry, where new technologies and new services continually arise, has led to new players with different specializations. The increased degree of specialization means that these players need to cooperate with each other in different types of projects. Problem definition: What factors are important in a project to achieve the objectives as quickly as possible? More players should lead to cooperation difficulties, how can you coordinate in the best possible way? Today, it is desirable for all parties in the project to shorten down the lead time. Purpose: The main purpose is to explore the different factors that affects the project's lead time concerning broadband installation. The part purpose, is to analyze and assess the conditions for cooperation between different players in the project for broadband installation and to provide a recommendation. Method: In order to answer the problem definition, the paper is structured around a qualitative approach with interviews to obtain data. Mostly, the used data comes from primary sources with an extension of secondary sources. Theories: Theories that are used in the paper are: Communication Process, Communication Plan, Project Planning &amp; Project Plan, Efficiency through collaboration, Communication in a network. Empiric: Empirical data consists of primary data collected through interviews. Analysis: The analysis is based on the variables from the theoretical frame of reference; Communications, Planning, Interaction &amp; Information. From these variables, empirical data are analyzed in relation to the theory. Conclusion: In the conclusion, the authors discuss about the projects process which is described in the paper. The authors have concluded that; communication, planning and collaboration plays a major role in order to shorten down the lead times for the project. Cooperation beyond enterprise boundaries becomes necessary.

This is a Master’s Thesis that has been carried out at the Global Outbound Logistics department at Scania. Scania manufactures trucks, buses and engines. Some trucks and buses are delivered to markets where it, due to reduced customs duties and cheaper manpower, is more profitable to do the assembly locally at so called Regional Product Centres (RPCs). Since the components are produced far away from the RPC markets the lead times become long. In addition, the customers’ buying behaviour at the RPC markets is often not comparable to the European culture were a customer can accept to wait for weeks for a unit to be delivered. The long lead time in combination with the customer behaviour implies that the RPCs need to keep a certain selection of standard models of buses and trucks in stock. It has turned out to be difficult for the pipeline managers at the RPCs to place order volumes that correspond well to what will be delivered to the business units or distributors later on. The result of this is high stock levels at the RPCs, which leads to an important amount of tied up capital. Due to what is explained above, the purpose of this study is “to create a simulation model, based upon a process mapping, that visualises future volume levels in the pipeline due to different demand and ordering scenarios”. The short term target, which is also the target of this study, is to increase the RPCs understanding for how different demand and ordering scenarios influence the future volume levels in the pipeline. The long term target is to reduce tied up capital by adjusting buffer levels and lead times, while still ensuring a certain service level. The model should contribute to more accurate decision making with respect to the previous mentioned aspects. First, a high level process mapping was made in order to select which flows that were suitable for being subject for a detailed mapping. Second, a detailed mapping was made during which several RPC-, process- and function responsible were interviewed. After the detailed mapping, common denominators between the flows were identified and all activities were clustered into a solution that could be generalised and suitable for all flows. Factors such as lead times, deviation risks and capacity limitations were taken into account during the aggregation of activities. When a common view of the different RPC flows had been created, the mathematical relationships for how the goods can move throughout the process could be established. Then, the development and validation of the simulation model, which was an iterative process, could start. A directive was to build the simulation model in Microsoft Excel. Interviews were made with experienced model creators in order to find out how to create a user-friendly and robust model. The creation of the simulation model started with the development of a structure and then the content of each part was defined. A final validation, which consisted of sensitivity analysis and user trials, was finally done in order to ensure the simulation models functioning and accuracy. To conclude, a simulation model that will serve as a helpful tool for the RPCs when they are to decide which order volumes to place has been created. By clearly visualising the simulation results, the simulation model will hopefully increase the RPCs’ comprehension for how the pipeline works with respect to different ordering and demand scenarios. On top of this, the method used, the process mapping and the mathematical relationships that have been defined are important input for a possible future development of a more permanent and robust non-Microsoft Excel solution. This solution could probably be even more precise, automatically updated and have an even higher granularity.

Globalization and increased product variety have impacted the uncertainty in demand and supply. The recent financial instability adds another layer of uncertainty regarding financing and investment. The changes, while gradual, have accumulated over time and posed enormous difficulties in planning procurement. This thesis focuses on inventory procurement strategies that help firms tackle challenges due to uncertainties in the demand/supply and financial concerns. The first part is on employing dynamic inventory procurement strategies to achieve cost efficiency and tackle the uncertainties in demand and supply. The second and third parts focus on the interaction between Finance and Operations in both its analytic aspects and empirical aspects. A synopsis of the three parts of the thesis follows. Part 1: “Inventory Management and Stochastic Lead Time” This chapter analyzes a continuous time back-ordered inventory system with stochastic demand and stochastic delivery lags for placed orders. This problem in general has an infinite dimensional state space and is hence intractable. We first obtain the set of minimal conditions for reducing such a system’s state space to one-dimension and show how this reduction is done. Next, by modeling demand as a diffusion process, we reformulate the inventory control problem as an impulse control problem. We simplify the impulse control problem to a Quasi-Variation Inequality (QVI). Based on the QVI formulation, we obtain the optimality of the (s, S) policy and the limiting distribution of the inventory level. We also obtain the long run average cost of such an inventory system. Finally, we provide a method to solve the QVI formulation. Using a set of computational experiments, we show that significant losses are incurred in approximating a stochastic lead time system with a fixed lead time system, thereby highlighting the need for such stochastic lead time models. We also provide insights into the dependence of this value loss on various problem parameters. Part 2: “Inventory Financing and Trade Credit” In this chapter, we study the inventory performance of publicly listed retailers between 1980 and 2010 based on a panel dataset from COMPUSTAT, CRSP, I/B/E/S and a hand-collected dataset on bankruptcy. We quantify the effect of a carefully-defined financial holding cost on inventory decisions, after controlling for operational factors and considering access to trade credit. This finding provides empirical evidence of the failure of the Modigliani-Miller Theorem in the inventory management context. We are also able to infer several unobservable costs based on historical inventory decisions. For example, the average cost of trade credit is estimated to be about 20% per year, which matches the typical trade credit terms in the United States. We find that the cost of trade credit computed has a strong connection to inventory per- formance. Our findings are robust to alternative econometric specifications, alternative measures of variables and model estimates for subsets of data. Part 3: “Joint Inventory and Cash Management Decisions” In this chapter, we address this question by considering a general con- tinuous time model of a dynamic inventory system that incurs costs in both managing the inventory and managing the cash flow. To support its inventory and operational cost, this system has access to both the financial market and trade credit from suppliers. We show how the inventory procurement decision and financing decision are made jointly. Specifically, we show that, with friction of financing, not only does the Modigliani-Miller Theorem not hold but also the two decisions interact in a dynamic and complex manner. We are also able to show how the value of the inventory system can be improved by using trade credit. / text