TECHNOLOGY AND OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT

1. TECHNOLOGY AND OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT CHAPTER 5 DAVID A. COLLIER AND JAMES R. EVANS

2. LO1Describe different types of technology and their role in manufacturing and service operations. LO2Explain how manufacturing and service technology is strengthening the value chain. LO3Explain the benefits and challenges of using technology. LO4Describe key technology decisions and the processes of technology adoption.

3. Staples is a large, well-known, distributor of office products in the United States, often recognized for its “easy button” commercials. But managing and working in their distributions is not always easy, especially when they have a goal of next-day delivery. Most warehouses and distribution centers rely on people to locate and retrieve items. People get fatigued and can make errors reading product numbers or pulling the wrong item off the shelves. However, Staples took the “easy” concept into their back-office order-fulfillment operations in a very innovative way—they use robots. Automated robots are more reliable, and managers don’t have to worry about them calling in sick either!

4. Staples uses small, 2-foot high by 3-foot long machines that travel along the aisles of a warehouse by reading special bar-code stickers on the floor. A computer sends stock location information to the robots, which slide under the storage racks that contain the goods, lift them up, and bring them to stations where real people pull the products and pack them for shipping. Then they return the racks back to their original locations. They’re even programmed to travel to recharging stations when their batteries run low. As a result, Staples improved productivity by 60%, making it much easier to meet its customer service promises.

5. What do youthink? In what ways has technology benefited your life and work as a student?

6. Importance of Technology • Technology—both physical and information—has dramatically changed how work is accomplished in every industry, from mining to manufacturing to education to health care. • Technological innovation in goods, services, manufacturing, and service delivery is a competitive necessity.

7. Hard technologyrefers to equipment and devices that perform a variety of tasks in the creation and delivery of goods and services. • Soft technologyis the application of the Internet, computer software, and information systems to provide data, information, and analysis, and to facilitate the accomplishment of creating and delivering goods and services.

8. Manufacturing Technology • The right technology must be selected for the goods that are produced. • Process resources, such as machines and employees, must be set up and configured in a logical fashion to support production efficiency. • Labor must be trained to operate the equipment. • Process performance must be continually improved. • Work must be scheduled to meet shipping commitments/customer promise dates. • Quality must be ensured.

9. Computer-Integrated Manufacturing Systems • Computer-integrated manufacturing systems (CIMS) represent the union of hardware, software, database management, and communications to automate and control production activities. • Numerical control (NC) machine tools enable the machinist’s skills to be duplicated by a programmable device (originally punched paper tape) that controls the movements of a tool used to make complex shapes. • A robot is a programmable machine designed to handle materials or tools in the performance of a variety of tasks.

10. Computer-Integrated Manufacturing Systems • CAD/CAE enables engineers to design, analyze, test, simulate, and “manufacture” products before they physically exist. • CAMinvolves computer control of the manufacturing process. • Flexible manufacturing systems (FMS)consist of two or more computer-controlled machines linked by automated handling devices. Computers direct the overall sequence of operations and route the work to the appropriate machine, select and load the proper tools, and control the operations performed by the machine.

11. CIMS Facts According to the National Research Council, companies with computer-integrated manufacturing system experience have been able to: • decrease engineering design costs by up to 30 percent; • increase productivity by 40 to 70 percent; • increase equipment utilization by a factor of 2 to 3; • reduce work-in-process and lead times by 30 to 60 percent; and • improve quality by a factor of 3 to 4.

12. Service Technology • Service technologies are used behind the scenes to facilitate your experience as a customer. • E-servicerefers to using the Internet and technology to provide services that create and deliver time, place, information, entertainment, and exchange value to customers and/or support the sale of goods.

14. Exhibit 5.1 E-Commerce View of the Value Chain

15. Technology in Value Chains • An intermediaryis any entity—real or virtual—that coordinates and shares information between buyers and sellers. • Return facilitators specialize in handling all aspects of customers returning a manufactured good or delivered service and requesting their money back, repairing the manufactured good and returning it to the customer, and/or invoking the service guarantee.

16. Enterprise Resource Planning • Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)systems integrate all aspects of a business—accounting, customer relationship management, supply chain management, manufacturing, sales, human resources—into a unified information system and provide more timely analysis and reporting of sales, customer, inventory, manufacturing, human resource, and accounting data.

17. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) • Two prominent vendors of ERP software are SAP and Oracle. • ERP combines each department’s information into a single, integrated system with a common database so that departments can easily share information and communicate with each other.

18. Customer Relationship Management Systems • Customer Relationship Management (CRM)is a business strategy designed to learn more about customers’ wants, needs, and behaviors in order to build customer relationships and loyalty, and ultimately enhance revenues and profits.

19. Benefits of CRM • Segmenting markets based on demographic and behavioral characteristics. • Tracking sales trends and advertising effectiveness by customer and market segment. • Identifying which customers should be the focus of targeted marketing initiatives with predicted high customer response rates. • Forecasting customer retention (and defection) rates and providing feedback as to why customers leave the company.

20. Benefits of CRM • Identifying which transactions are likely candidates to be fraudulent. • Studying which goods and services are purchased together, and what might be good ways to bundle them (that is, the customer benefit package). • Studying and predicting what Web characteristics are most attractive to customers and how the Web site might be improved. • Linking the information above to competitive priorities by market segment and process and value chain performance.

21. Exhibit 5.2 Example Benefits and Challenges of Adopting Technology

22. Technology Decisions and Implementation • Scalability is a measure of the contribution margin required to deliver a good or service as the business grows and volumes increase. • High scalabilityis the capability to serve additional customers at zero or extremely low incremental costs (e.g., Monster.com). • Low scalabilityimplies that serving additional customers requires high incremental variable costs (e.g., see WebVan). • Many of the dot.coms that failed in the year 2000 had low scalability and unsustainable demand (see WebVan, for example).

24. Technology Adoption How Intel describes the history of technology revolutions: • Stage I. Birth • Stage II. Turbulence • Stage III. Build-out • Examples: • Global Digital Revolution (see text box) • U.S. Railroad Industry

25. Bracket International—The RFID Decision Case Study • How does RFID compare to bar-coding? • What is the economic payback in years for this possible RFID adoption? • What are the risks of adopting a new technology too early? Too late? • What do you recommend Mr. Bracket do in the short and long terms? Explain your reasoning.