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The head of the key account team at Ai Li Industrial Company Ltd. (Ai Li) was discussing the possibility of bidding for a new account with a major North American department store. The account would involve the manufacture of compact cosmetics kits for the upcoming holiday season. Although the potential benefits from the considerably large order would be significant, it would require one third of Ai Li's nearly full manufacturing capacity.

The production manager at Lake Erie Paper (LEP) was considering installing a moisture meter to test the water content of the wood chips used to make corrugated paper. Use of a moisture meter would speed up the testing process and could reduce costs and/or improve paper quality, but the manager wanted to be sure that the meter provided a consistent and reliable measure of the water content of the arriving woodchips.

The production manager at Lake Erie Paper (LEP) was considering installing a moisture meter to test the water content of the wood chips used to make corrugated paper. Use of a moisture meter would speed up the testing process and could reduce costs and/or improve paper quality, but the manager wanted to be sure that the meter provided a consistent and reliable measure of the water content of the arriving woodchips.

A research institute has a concern with the reliability requirements of a military vehicle. Reliability is the probability that a system will accomplish its designated mission in a satisfactory manner or in more specific terms, the probability that it will perform in a satisfactory manner for a given period when used under specified operating conditions. Reliability of a weapon system is often expressed in terms of mean time between failure (MTBF). Two military vehicles were tested to obtain reliability life data for reliability evaluation. The objective of this case is to introduce reliability concept, MTBF, life data analysis and objective procedure for a decision making.

The owners of a retail jewellry store must decide whether to continue to offer a snowfall promotion that gave customers a 100 per cent cash refund for all November and December purchases if there was more than 15 centimetres of snow on the following January 7.

The chairman of Tallink - a ferry and cargo service running between Estonia, Finland and Sweden - is considering purchasing a new ferry and redeploying older ferries among different routes. One of the proposed new routes is from Tallinn, Estonia through Helsinki, Finland to St. Petersburg in Russia. The chairman needs to decide whether or not he should buy the new ferry and the optimal use of his fleet.

Solver model for teaching note 8B05E04.

Mars Inc., one of the world's largest privately owned businesses, purchased over $4 billion of materials annually, and was aware that many major firms were achieving savings of around five per cent through the use of online procurement auctions. The vice-president for Business Solutions at Mars wondered whether an online auction could be designed that would meet the special needs of the Mars company while enabling Mars to achieve the savings necessary to allow the company to prosper and grow in its highly competitive markets.

Mars Inc., one of the world's largest privately owned businesses, purchased over $4 billion of materials annually and was aware that many major firms were achieving savings of around 5% through the use of online procurement auctions. The vice-president for business solutions at Mars wondered whether it was possible to design an online auction to meet the special needs of Mars while enabling Mars to achieve the savings necessary to allow the company to prosper and grow in its highly competitive markets.

Domglas Inc. must estimate the potential demand for ready-to-eat soup packaged in glass jars for the convenience of microwave-oven owners. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A80E002.)

The chief executive officer of Brent-Harbridge Developments had just received confirmation of several upcoming property auctions. Brent-Harbridge Developments was currently asset short after some successful recent disposals, which made the CEO keenly interested in three of the properties being auctioned. She needed to prepare a bidding strategy in order to try to acquire at least one or perhaps more of the development properties being auctioned. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A98E042.)

Management at PCB Manufacturing, Inc. was concerned that a significant number of faulty printed circuit boards were reaching their customers. Should the testing system be changed so that the number of bad boards being shipped decreases? (A Microsoft Excel model is available for use with this case, product 7A98E043.)

The CEO of Northern Napa Valley Winery must forecast aggregate sales of red table wine for the product year, as well as month-by-month sales for the same period. This case provides the student with the opportunity to try to forecast a time series characterized by distinct trend and seasonality with almost nine years of monthly data available. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A98E046.)

The newly appointed general manager of Alfonso's Department Store has initiated a review of Alfonso's newspaper marketing, in part to gain familiarity with the store's marketing practices, but also to look for ways to enhance both sales and market share. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A99E002.)

The comptroller at Four Star Fitness Club must set aside a financial reserve to cover possible refunds of initiation fees to new members. The comptroller has some historical data on refund payments to assist in estimating the size of the appropriate reserve.

Harry Lev was reviewing the recent sales reports for Bamberger's Department Store in an effort to assess whether or not the newly implemented Wednesday evening late openings had had a positive overall effect on sales. He was under some pressure to demonstrate that the sales during the extended hours were more than covering the added cost to the store of the late opening, since he had been instrumental in initiating this change despite strong employee resistance. If he could not clearly show a financial benefit, he could expect pressure to discontinue the experiment. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A99E006.)

The issue before the directors meeting of LanCo Catalogue Sales was the high level of product returns that the company was experiencing. These product returns were eroding profitability at a remarkable rate, however the directors were split into two camps over what to do about the problem. One camp believed that speeding up shipments would reduce the returned merchandise, while the other camp believed that this would merely increase shipping costs and reduce profits even further. LanCo management was determined that the returns problem must first be understood, then actions must be taken to reduce returns, in order to improve the profitability of the company. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A99E007.)

The proprietor of the Brooke Road 7-11 store was dismayed to learn of the shop's dismal financial performance the previous year. She knew that an employee had been caught stealing from the shop and had admitted taking $500 from the till over a period of about 4 months. The poor financial performance of the store could be explained if the actual amount stolen had been much larger than $500. The proprietor assembled weekly sales records in the hope of estimating the full impact and magnitude of the thefts. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A99E009.)

Ford Motor Company was concerned that five tug operators, each costing $100,000 annually over three shifts, was too many. Colin Cruji was hired to look into the tug operators and see if Ford could eliminate one or more of the five positions per shift. A supplement to this case is available, titled Ford Motor Company and Cruji Management Consulting (B), case 9A99E014. (A Microsoft Excel data file is available for use with this case, product 7A99E013.)

Excel spreadsheet for product 9B01E009.