Zugl.: Osnabrück, Universiẗat, Diss., 2007.

<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>

<p>It is of increasing importance to in the most effective possible way, manage and control all the transactions of raw materials, products and information that are exchanged between an organization and all its operators. These flows and the need for strategy and managing the processes of planning, implementing and control of the supply chain, has given name to the concept supply chain management. Supply chain management involves all movement and storage of raw material, and all the processes that is needed to manufacture a product from origin to consumption. Globalization, technology and increasing time and quality-based competition are all driving forces behind the concept and reasons for an increasing interest in supply chain management.</p><p>The purpose of this essay is to by using a qualitative case study examine which decisive success factors that can be identified for effective supply chain management. We have compiled different theories on the subject to use for analyzing a case study Li & Fung, who is a successful supply chain management company. We intend to give a detailed description of this complex concept and identify decisive success factors for effective supply chain management.</p><p>The study shows two prominent aspects for effective supply chain management; (1) Leadership and (2) control of the supply chain.</p>

<p>During our study trip to Tanzania we discovered one of the great issues for farmers to be need of running water. So we asked ourselves: How can water from Lake Victoria be transported to the small scale farmer’s household and farm in the most optimized way? During the stay in North West of Tanzania we made field trips to the rural areas in Mara Region in order to understand the farmers who are the potential users. We performed semi structured interviews and observations during the whole field study. We also came to the conclusion that wind is a good source of power which can be used to pump water. The wind comes in from Lake Victoria in the same direction everyday. So therefore we decided to construct a water pumping wind power station for small scale farmers.</p>

No description available.

We present an optimal methodology for synchronized scheduling of production assembly with air transportation to achieve accurate delivery with minimized cost in consumer electronics supply chain (CESC). This problem was motivated by a major PC manufacturer in consumer electronics industry, where it is required to schedule the delivery requirements to meet the customer needs in different parts of South East Asia. The overall problem is decomposed into two sub-problems which consist of an air transportation allocation problem and an assembly scheduling problem. The air transportation allocation problem is formulated as a Linear Programming Problem with earliness tardiness penalties for job orders. For the assembly scheduling problem, it is basically required to sequence the job orders on the assembly stations to minimize their waiting times before they are shipped by flights to their destinations. Hence the second sub-problem is modelled as a scheduling problem with earliness penalties. The earliness penalties are assumed to be independent of the job orders. / Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA)

We consider the optimization problem of safety stock placement in a supply chain, as formulated in [1]. We prove that this problem is NP-Hard for supply chains modeled as general acyclic networks. Thus, we do not expect to find a polynomial-time algorithm for safety stock placement for a general-network supply chain. / Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA)

Thesis (M.A.)--Ohio University, June, 2006. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references (p. 30-32)

The objectives of this work were to evaluate the vegetative parameters used to estimate crop N demand and to estimate the accuracy and precision of the conceptual model of fertilization using an error propagation method. Corn plants were collected throughout the entire crop life cycle to determine the fresh and dry weight of the aboveground biomass and roots, root index, plant height, and corn grain yield. Three experiments were conducted, two under field conditions and one under greenhouse conditions. In the first field experiment in 2002, three sites were selected. The first site was the Texas A&M University (TAMU) Agricultural Experiment Station Research Farm in which a Ships clay soil was used. The second site was a cooperative farmer's land on a Weswood silt loam soil in Burleson County. These first two sites used Pioneer 32R25 as the corn hybrid. The third site was also a Ships soil in the TAMU Farm, but Dekalb 687 was the corn variety. In 2003, the second experiment was on a Ships soil in the field of TAMU Farm, and the third experiment was conducted in a greenhouse using Ships and Weswood soil. No differences in the root index and harvest index were observed, even when the Dekalb 687 hybrid was included. Variations in plant N concentration, moisture content, and yield were noted, but followed predictable patterns with time over the season. These parameters were consistent throughout the entire life cycle of the crop. The linear relationship between the fresh weight of aboveground biomass and fresh weight of roots was R2 = 0.92, the moisture content of corn plants over time was fit to a second grade polynomial with R2 = 0.98, and plant N content had a close linear relationship (R2=0.90) with the total plant dry weight, including roots, at harvest. The accuracy of the conceptual model was low under field conditions (55%), but high under greenhouse conditions (90%). Precision of the conceptual model was low both in the field (194%) and the greenhouse (115%) conditions.

This thesis examines the labor force participation decisions of married couples, and special attention is paid to a spouse’s health conditions affecting their own and the spouse’s labor force participation decision. I used the Health and Retirement Study survey data and estimated a seemingly unrelated bivariate probit model. A number of variables besides health condition were added: age, education level, and family unearned income. The results of this research paper support the findings from the relevant literature that the labor supply decisions of the husband and wife are related. The oldest age group is least likely to work. The younger the husband, the more likely it is that the husband will work. At the ages between 40 and 49, wives have the biggest probability to work. The higher the education level, the more likely it is that a spouse is going to work. The more total family unearned income, the less probable the spouse will go to work. Poor health has a negative effect on labor force participation and a positive effect for the spouse’s labor force participation.