IMT – 69: LOGISTICS AND SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT

PART – A

Q1. "There are many possible structures for supply chain, but the simplest view has materials converging on an organisation through tiers of suppliers and products diverging through tiers of customers." Elaborate.

Q2. Explain clearly the meaning of "World-Class" in World-Class Supply Chain Management (WCSCM). What are the features of World-Class Companies? Give your answer highlighting different characteristics pertaining to management level, quality control, operations/production and technological advances.

Q3. Define Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). Give its tangible and intangible benefits. Why does a company pursue a new ERP solution?

 Q4. When Christopher says that "Supply chains compete, not companies" what exactly does he mean? Evaluate this statement from the cost point of view.

 Q5. What is meant by logistical competency? Explain the role of logistic in supply chain management? Discuss in detail the element of logistic cost?

 PART – B 

Q1. What is logistic positioning? Explain the time based control techniques of logistic.

Q2. “Customer service is the output of logistic and supply chain management and it is key interface between marketing functions and logistic function”. Discuss.

Q3. What is supply chain management? What are the factor affecting distributions in supply chain management?

Q4. What are the essential differences in the Supply Chain Management of Products vs. Services? Discuss the application of Supply Chain Management principles in Financial Services.

Q5. What is artificial intelligence? Discuss managerial levels use to supply chain profitability.

PART – C

Q1. What is meant by co-ordination in SCM? What are the effects of lack of co-ordination in supply chain?

Q2. What is Physical Distribution Management (PDM)? Why is PDM considered to be a critical area of overall supply chain management? Discuss the system or 'total' approach to PDM in detail.

Q3. Define SCM integration and discuss the four stages of Steven's model of supply chain integration. Also, describe the strategies involved in SCM integration. 

Q4. "Many innovations on technology-based approaches are well-suited to the enhancement of the effectiveness of Supply Chain Management"-Justify the statement by giving few applications of information technology in SCM.

Q5. Why is the location of warehouse important for the SCM? Discuss some methods for determining the location of the warehouse

CASE STUDY – I

Passenger Interchange

In most major cities the amount of congestion on the roads is increasing. Some of this is due to commercial vehicles, but by far the majority is due to private cars. There are several ways of controlling the number of vehicles using certain areas. These include prohibition of cars in pedestrian areas, restricted entry, limits on parking, traffic calming schemes, and so on. A relatively new approach has road-user charging, where cars pay fees to use a particular length of road, with the fee possibly changing with prevailing traffic conditions.

Generally, the most effective approach to reducing traffic congestion is to improve public transport. These services must be attractive to people who judge them by a range of factors, such as the comfort of seating, amount of crowding, handling of luggage, availability of food, toilets, safety, and facilities in waiting areas, availability of escalators and lifts, and so on. However, the dominant considerations are cost, time and reliability.

Buses are often the most flexible form of public transport, with the time for a journey consisting of four parts:

·         joining time, which is the time needed to get to a bus stop

·         waiting time, until the bus arrives

·         journey time, to actually do the traveling

·         Leaving time, to get from the bus to the final destination.

Transport policies can reduce these times by combination of frequent services, well-planned routes, and bus priority schemes. Then convenient journeys and subsidized travel make buses an attractive alternative.

One problem, however, is that people have to change buses, or transfer between buses and other types of transport, including cars, planes, trains, ferries and trams. Then there are additional times for moving between one type of transport and the next, and waiting for the next part of the service. These can be minimized by an integrated transport system with frequent, connecting services at 'passenger interchanges'.

Passenger interchanges seem a good idea, but they are not universally popular. Most people prefer a straight through journey between two points, even if this is less frequent than an integrated service with interchanges. The reason is probably because there are more opportunities for things to go wrong, and experiences suggests that even starting a journey does not guarantee that it will successfully finish.

In practice, most major cities such as London and Paris have successful interchanges, and they are spreading into smaller towns, such as Montpellier in France. For thirteen years up to 2010, the population of Montpellier grew by more than 8.4 per cent, and it moved from being the 22nd largest town in France to the eighth largest. It has good transport links with the porti of Sete, an airport, inland waterways, main road networks and a fast rail link to Paris. In 2001, public transport was enhanced with a 15 kilometer tramline connecting major sites in the town centre with other transport links. At the same time, buses were rerouted to connect to the tram, cycling was encouraged for short distances, park-and-ride services were improved, and journeys were generally made easier, As a result, there has been an increase in use of public transport, a reduction in the number of cars in the town centre, and improved air quality. When the tram opened in 2000, a third of the population tried it in the first weekend, and it carried a million people within seven weeks of opening. In 2005, a second tramline will add 19 kilometers to the routes.

Questions:

(a) Are the problems of moving people significantly different from the problems of moving goods or Services?

(b) What are the benefits of public transport over private transport? Should public transport be encouraged, if so, how?

(c) What are the benefits of integrated public transport systems?

CASE STUDY – II

Kozmo, the online convenience store to shut down

New York-based Kozmo, the 3-year-old company announced that it would stop delivery service in all nine cities it operates. New York-based Kozmo, which dispatched legions of orange-clad deliverymen to cart goods to customers' doors, is the latest dot.com dream to evaporate in the market downturn. Amazon com, venture capital firm Flatiron Partners and coffee giant Starbucks were among the investors in Kozmo.

Kozmo said in December that investors promised a total of $30 million in private funding. But last month the company learned that an investor had backed out of a $6 million commitment. Kozmo executives had been working on a merger deal with Los Angeles-based PD Quick, another online grocer, sources said. The deal collapsed when funding that was promised to PD Quick did not materialize. Sources said Kozmo still has money but decided to close now and liquidate to ensure that employees could receive a severance package.

Just last month, Kozmo Chief Executive Gerry Burdo was upbeat about Kozmo's future, saying he was looking to steer Kozmo away from its Internet-only business model and toward a "clicks and bricks" approach. But some analysts say Kozmo's business model only made sense in the context of a densely packed city such as New York. Vern Keenan, a financial analyst with Keenan Vision, said the service had a chance to work in only a few other cities around the world, such as London, Stockholm or Paris. "This seemed like a dumb idea from the beginning," Keenan said. "This grew out of a New York City frame of mind and it simply didn't translate."

Kozmo was started by a pair of twenty-something former college roommates. They got the idea for the company on a night when they craved videos and snacks and wished a business existed that would deliver it to them. Kozmo offered free delivery and charged competitive prices when it launched in New York. Though customers loved the service, the costs of delivery were high.

After co-founder and former Chief Executive Joseph Park stepped down, Burdo slashed Kozmo's overhead, instituted a delivery fee and oversaw several rounds of layoffs. The company also closed operations in San Diego and Houston. Burdo said last month that profitability was not far away. The company had reached a milestone last December when it reported profits at one of its operations for the first time. Kozmo later saw two more operations reach profitability as a result of brisk holiday business.

Online delivery companies have been among the most ravaged by the Internet shakeout. Kozmo's rival in New York, Urbanfetch, shuttered its consumer operations last fall. Online grocers such as Webvan and Peapod have also struggled, and smaller operations such as Streamline.com and ShopLink.com have dosed down. Peapod was days away from closing last year when Dutch grocer Royal Ahold agreed to take a majority stake.

From the very beginning, supply chain management was to be a core competency of Kozmo. The promising dot.com would deliver your order everything from the latest video to electronics equipment in less than an hour. The technology was superior, the employees were enthusiastic, and the customers were satisfied. But eventually, Kozmo ran out of time and money.

Questions:

(a) What, in your opinion, is the major reason for the failure of Kozmo?

(b) Do you think that Kozmo promised what its supply chain could not bear? What could have prevented its