Clark Industries wants to introduce a new and improved Green Chile Processor, th
ID: 434476 • Letter: C
Question
Clark Industries wants to introduce a new and improved Green Chile Processor, the Clark GCP 4000, to replace the popular GCP 3000. Due to demand projections, the GCP 3000 will be out of stock on 1 January 2019 and will be immediately replaced by the GCP 4000. Clarck industries sells the GCP 3000 worldwide with most sales in the Northern Hemisphere. The CEO assumes that GCP 3000 sales over the previous 24 months to be the best forecasting tool for GCP 4000 sales in the ?rst 12 months following introduction. Monthly sales for the past 24 months are as follows:
Line Balancing Information: The GCP 4000 is produced with the following steps:
Additional Information: • A backorder costs Clark Industries $10 per item.
• Storing an item at the warehouse costs $2 per item per month.
• Based on training and severance, there is a one-time $2000 cost for hiring a worker and a $3000 for ?ring a worker due to production.
Based on the last 24 months of sales with the GCP 3000, what general hypotheses can you make about demand??
What methods would you use to forecast the next 12 months based on previous data? Why?
Given the product structure, what is your ordering strategy for vendor-procured items for 2019??
Determine how the jobs should be scheduled in order to minimize the total makespan. Include an appropriate chart indicating the optimal schedule.
Using line balancing, how you recommend structuring work? How many assembly lines are needed based on a 36 hour workweek and 4 week month.?
How do you recommend switching production from the GCP 3000 to the GCP 4000?
2017 2018 10167 9614 January February 10279 10325 March April May June July August September 19697 20016 October 19882 19665 November 9993 10066 December 9986 9949 10106 10107 9896 9596 9807 9596 10182 9896 24819 25348 25141 25050Explanation / Answer
a) The following hypotheses can be made about the demand:
1) The demand is lean from November to June and is high from July to October. The demand for GCP is seasonal.
b) We can use the average of the last 2 years to forecast the demand for the next year. The difference in the 2 years is not much and hence average should be a good way to forecast.
c) For the vendor procured items we should order in sufficient numbers so that A B and C can be manufactured without any bottleneck.