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Understanding production chains
We always talk about the supply chain, the value chain, production chains, but we rarely take the time to stop and think about what these different chains mean in practice. In this post, we are going to demystify production chains, how they relate and what they have to do with us, consumers of the final…
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Scheduling: rules and performance indicators
Scheduling aims at controlling and balancing workload from tasks to resources in a production system. Many of its characteristics and goals are covered in our post Scheduling Problems. Here, we focus on solving the problem and measuring the quality of a schedule plan. Sequencing rules Given a set of orders, how to assign them to…
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Scheduling problems
Scheduling problems appear in several industries. A manufacturing company must decide the sequence and machines used in the production process of each product; a delivery company must decide on the sequence of customers to visit; a transportation company must determine which of its vehicles to use in the trips. Take an airline company for instance. How many…
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Material requirements planning (MRP) – what will be needed and when?
Imagine a company that produces electronic equipment such as stereos and TVs. There are several models, sizes, powers, but many components and raw materials are common for various models. To satisfy future demand, how many components should be in inventory in each period? When should each part be ordered? And how many units of each?…
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Production management – What it is and how to do it?
Large manufacturing companies run several production facilities and work with budgets and incomes in the order of many millions of dollars. Imagine a large conglomerate of companies that manufacturing dozens or hundreds of products in various locations around the world: their processes are unique and involve high fixed costs, and they must maintain an equally…