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1. KLF Electronics is an American manufacturer of electronic equipment. The company has a single manufacturing facility in San Jose California. (20 points)

KLF Electronics distributes its products through five regional warehouses located in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, and Los Angeles. In the current distribution system, the United States is partitioned into five major markets, each of which is served by a single regional warehouse. Customers, typically retail outlets, receive items directly from the regional warehouses in their market area. That is, in the current distribution system, each customer is assigned to a single market and receives deliveries from one regional warehouse.

The warehouses receive items from the manufacturing facility, Typically, it takes about two weeks to satisfy an order placed by any of the regional warehouses. In recent years, KLF has seen a significant increase in competition and huge pressure from their customers to improve service levels and reduce costs. To improve service level and reduce costs, KLF would like to consider an alternative distribution strategy in which the five regional warehouses are replaced with a single, central warehouse that will be in charge of all customer orders.

Part A: Describe how you would design a new logistics network consisting of only a single warehouse.

Part B: Provide an outline of such an analysis; what are the main steps?

Part C: Specifically, what data would you need?

Part D: What are the advantages and disadvantages of the newly suggested distribution strategy relative to the existing distribution strategy?

2. As the Purchasing Manager in a manufacturing firm, you would be expected to identify and know various aspects related to transportation/traffic in order to effectively perform your job. Today, during the staff meeting, your boss asked you for advice on two aspects of transportations: (20 points)

a. What are the major considerations when handling materials?
i. Discuss the following:
1. Load Unitization,
2. Space Layout,
3. Storage Equipment Choices, and
4. Movement Equipment Choices.

b. What legal forms of transportation are available to the company?
i. Identify the legal forms of transportation.
ii. Discuss the legal forms of transportation.
iii. Provide one example for each legal form of transportation.

3. Consider the supply chain for breakfast cereal. Discuss the competing objectives of the farmers who make the raw materials, the manufacturing division of the company that makes the cereal, the logistics division of the company that makes the cereal, the marketing division of the company that make the cereal, the distribution arm of the grocery chain that sells the cereal, and the manager of the individual grocery store that sells the cereal. (20 points)

4. You have been called in as a consultant to a large drugstore chain which has 24,000 inventory line items. Explain how inventory classification could help this company to better control its inventory. (20 points)

5. Discuss how each of the following helps to alleviate the bullwhip effect: (20 points)
a. E-Commerce and the Internet
b. Express Delivery
c. Collaborative forecasts
d. Everyday low pricing
e. Vendor-managed inventory

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Solution Summary

The response addresses the queries posted in1718 Words, APA References

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The response addresses the queries posted in1718 Words, APA References

Answer 1

Part A: Logistics design

Due to increasing competition in the world, the company has to advance its logistics system. To meet the ever increasing demands of the customers, the company is planning to form a single regional warehouse that will be in charge of the customer orders. Logistics is responsible for the movement of people and materials in the organization. Logistics department of the company decides as to how and when, the raw materials or other finished or semi-finished products should be moved and stored (Li, 2007).

If the company plans for a single warehousing system, then it is basically focusing on the centralized warehousing which is responsible for serving the whole market. The network will be designed with the help of complete analysis of the company's operations. This will help to design an efficient strategy for the company. The location and size of the warehouse will be decided. The transportation and facility costs will also be calculated. The cost set up will be properly estimated. The network will consist of various facilities like manufacturing center, vendor, distribution center and customers. There will also be a variety of raw materials and finished products that flow among these facilities.

Part B: Steps

There are various steps that will be involved for designing a new logistics activity. In the first step, the currently operating network in the organization should be analyzed. In the second step, the network optimization database should be designed and populated. After this in the third step, the alternatives for network design should be created. In the fourth step, the network optimization model should be adopted. In the fifth step, the tool for network optimization should be selected. In the sixth step, the network optimization should be implemented. In the seventh step, the alternative network designs will be evaluated. In the last and the final step, the reconfiguration costs for the network will be analyzed (How to design a logistics network in 10 steps? 2006).

Part C: Data Required

The data that will be required for this design network is as follows:

· A list of all the products of the company.

· The location of the customers.

· Warehousing cost and transportation cost.

· Demands of the customer for each product.

· Size of shipment by product.

· Cost of processing the order.

· Patterns of the orders by size, content and frequency (The Logistics Network: design and planning, 2001).

Part D: Advantages & Disadvantages

The newly suggested strategy will help the company in a number of ways. It will help in speeding up the production activities of the company. It will reduce the facility cost of the company. The safety stock required in centralized system is also less. It will also reduce the inbound transportation costs. The disadvantages of such a system are that the lead time will ...

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Ashish Sharma, MBA (IP)
Education
  • MBA (IP), International Center for Internationa Business
  • BBA, University of Rajasthan
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