Arvinder P. S. Loomba

Service Driven Global Supply Chains

Value‐added services expand manufacturing organizations’ ability to compete beyond traditional measures of manufacturing competitiveness such as cost, quality, flexibility, and delivery. This concept of expanding the roles of factories to include service has received considerable attention and wide acceptance among both researchers and practitioners. For example, recent empirical studies have demonstrated that manufacturing performance, particularly delivery performance can be enhanced through expanded service roles that focus on effective information flows within the company and to external customers. Despite such benefits, the scope of analysis has been limited to individual manufacturing organizations. Given the realities of global competition, practitioners require knowledge that extends beyond individual organizations. The domain of their problems includes the complexities of interactions with multiple stakeholders along global supply chains. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to extend the concept of the service factory to global supply chains. Specifically, the approach will be to provide a conceptualization of the role of service in global supply chain management that can be used as a starting point for discussion and further research in this area. We provide several propositions and conclude with implications for both researchers and practitioners.

Enhancing value in reverse supply chains by sorting before product recovery

Offering a well-designed reverse supply chain programme can significantly improve the ability of any organisation to differentiate itself, and even to take market share away, from its competitors. Reverse supply chain considerations should be a part of an organisations corporate strategy. From a macro-level perspective, value propositions of reverse supply chains in for an organisation, and/or the industry in which the organisation operates, include considerations for both strategies (to reuse, repair, refurbish, remanufacture, retrieve parts or cannibalise components, recycle, scrap, redesign returned products, etc.) and effective operations (to handle and sort returns by value and ease of remanufacture) to sustain and even enhance organisational competency. In this article, we examine the role of sorting used products before disassembly for parts retrieval and remanufacturing under stochastic variability based on customer demand using a Markov decision process. We address a problem of managing costs in a remanufacturing environment with stochastically variable demand and model it for two types of used parts. Each part type is assumed to have varying quality and acquisition costs. The cost function includes manufacturing, holding and backlog costs components. We compute optimal purchase policy that maximises the expected average profit per period. Using a case example from photocopier industry, numerical analysis is performed to study the implications of various holding cost for two parts on optimal purchase policy in remanufacturing environments.

Marketing–production coordination in channels of distribution

Abstract In this paper, we analyze the effects of functional (horizontal) decentralization by a channel member on the performance of an industrial channel of distribution. We use the model of (Eliashberg, J., Steinberg, R., 1987. Management Science 33, 981–1000), which describes a channel of distribution consisting of a manufacturer and a value-adding distributor. We allow the distributor to decentralize decision-making between his marketing and production functions. Our results show that functional decentralization at the distributor level increases the price sensitivity of the distributor concerning the price he faces from the manufacturer, causes a shift in the distributors demand curve, increases the distributors inventory activities, in terms of both quantity and time frame, and under certain conditions, increases the manufacturers inventory. As expected, the decentralized distributor has a less-coordinated pricing policy vis-a-vis the production policy. Using numerical means, we show that functional decentralization can improve the overall channel profitability, i.e., for both manufacturer and distributor. This counter-intuitive result suggests that in our non-repeated perfect information game setting, functional decentralization can yield a Pareto-dominant equilibrium outcome where both the distributor and manufacturer are better off, even though it is only the distributor who is changing his organizational decision-making.

Sustainable Ecodesign Mapping of End-of-Life Strategies for Improved Products/Processes Management

There is immense pressure from various stakeholders for producers to become more environmentally sustainable. Using ecodesign considerations to manage product and operations process decisions is often viewed as the next frontier in organizational competitiveness. When considered in early design stages of a product, ecodesign decisions can significant improves life cycle sustainability although substantial hurdles have to be overcome to ensure ecodesign methods remain viable. We review past research to identify strategic elements of sustainable ecodesign mapping for various end-of-life strategies related to managing products and operations processes. Ecodesign mapping for sustainability is discussed with challenges addressed for industry practitioners.

Repurposing medical devices for LRCs — Sustainability considerations

The design, development, and production of medical devices is increasingly becoming an arduous endeavor, not only due to intensifying global competition and tightening regulatory oversight, but also due to ever-diversifying users needs around the world. The surmounting regulatory hurdles and prohibitive costs for developing and bringing new medical devices to markets, pose a strong detriment to adoption and care provision for healthcare users, particularly the ones in low resource countries (LRCs). The idea of repurposing existing devices for new geographical regions - not just for better global access to healthcare but also to increase profitability - warrants further consideration. We explore sustainability considerations and propose a method for implementing the repurposing initiative.

Parts quality-based priority policy in remanufacturing environments

Purpose - The purpose of this study is to consider the acquisition of end-of-life products under variable quality consideration for remanufacturing so as to determine optimal control policy that minimizes per-period expected costs that may guide future consideration by practitioners. Design/methodology/approach - The authors review recent literature on reverse supply chains and remanufacturing. They utilize an undiscounted Markov decision process methodology to ascertain the order amount of remanufacturable products using optimal control under minimum cost criterion. Findings - The authors conclude that it makes sense for firms to focus on the cost management with production control based on quality levels with different acquisition costs of remanufacturable products. Research limitations/implications - Although the Markov decision process methodology – which is well supported in literature – was diligently followed, the nature of analysis and discussion may be subject to authors’ bias. Future investigation and adoption of the methodological approach used will verify the paper findings. Practical implications - This study determines optimal control policy for ordering specific amount of product that minimizes per-period expected costs for remanufacturing. Reverse supply-chain professionals now have an easy-to-follow guide when acquiring end-of-life remanufacturable products alternatives with variable quality. Social implications - This study determines the optimal policy for ordering remanufacturable products. This information enables practitioners to reduce their carbon footprint in reverse supply chain through inspection/sorting before remanufacturing by processing only the type, quality, and quantity of needed product. Originality/value - For reverse supply chain to be taken seriously by senior management in firms, it is imperative that practitioners in this field synchronize their operational-level ordering decisions with holistic cost minimization objective (to maximize value recovery) to stay viable.