Operation Management 4. b) There are always uncertainties encountered in managing inventories from two basic reasons: 1.

Variability in sales, hence variability in the demand for the materials or the consumption of the materials. 2. Delay in the supplies of raw materials. Let us first restrict ourselves to the non-constant or uncertain consumption of materials. There may occur shortage of materials because of uncertainties. For instance, let us take the basic inventory model and consider the effect of a sudden increase in the demand rate of the material during an order cycle. It may be noted that in this model, which is technically termed the fixed order quantity type or a Q system, the uncertainty in the consumption rates affects the material availability only so far as the lead time is concerned. The increased demand which lead to a stock-out of the material before the replenishment can arrive is felt during the lead time only. The amount of extra stock (Buffer Stock) to be kept depends upon the more than average demand to be expected. In a probabilistic situation, various values of demand rate are possible with corresponding probability values.

Material Management SECTION B b) Problems and risks in vendor networking? There is no risk absolutely of a vendor support. Specially, for the service providing company or agencies it is important they have a vendor or vendors to support area of their expertise. A vendor support often is a prime reason to reduce downtime. The risk involved includes but not limit to 1. Vendors inability to fulfill the terms and conditions of the Service Level Agreement. 2. Use of contractors or contractors of vendors and then billed to the company, this can be expensive and can be handled with exceptional care and if the negotiation is not properly done this can lead to trouble to the company. 3. Vendors sometime get frustrated when their project or work order is not extended and can attempt to do something wrong with companys critical files/applications. 4. Vendor's sales team comprises of highly efficient and aggressive negotiators. If the negotiations not done sincerely, vendors can take advantage of it. 5. Every angle of Service Level Agreement must be inspected for risk and potential controls should be in place.

d) Use of OR techniques in material management Operations research (OR) and management science are terms that are used interchangeably to describe the discipline of applying quantitative techniques to make decisions and solve problems. Many methods used in operations research were developed during World War II to help take the guesswork out of missions such as deploying radar, searching for enemy submarines, and getting supplies where they were most needed. In which we can say that OR techniques are used in material management. Following the war, numerous peacetime applications emerged, leading to the use of OR and management science in many industries and occupations. The prevalence of operations research in the Nations economy reflects the growing complexity of managing large organizations that require the efficient use of materials, equipment, and people. OR analysts determine the optimal means of coordinating these elements to achieve specified goals by applying mathematical principles to organizational problems. They solve problems in different ways and propose alternative solutions to management, which then chooses the course of action that best meets their goals. In general, OR analysts are concerned with issues such as strategy, forecasting, resource allocation, facilities layout, inventory control, personnel schedules, and distribution systems. Upon concluding the analysis, the operations research analyst presents management with recommendations based on the results of the analysis. Additional computer programming based on different assumptions may be needed to help select the best recommendation offered by the OR analyst. Once management reaches a decision, the analyst may work with others in the organization to ensure the plans successful implementation.

Meterial Management 5. What is hand to mouth purchase? Hand to mouth purchase means limited purchase. Purchase which depends on the earning of a person. It refers to earning just enough in a day to feed someone for that day, similar to living pay check to pay check. That means the person is unable to save up anything for his future. 8. Define Despatch Despatch means sending of goods to a customer. After getting an order from the customer seller has to despatch the goods to the customer against a payment mode mutually decided by both the parties.

What is quality manual? Quality manual is an official document produced by a business house that
details how its quality management system operates. A typical quality manual will include the company's quality policy and goals, as well as a detailed description of

its quality control system that might include staff roles and relationships, procedures, systems and any other resources that relate to producing high quality goods or services.

SECTION B
A) Integrated Materials Management Various functions served by materials management include the material planning, purchasing, receiving, stores, inventory control, scrap and surplus disposal. All these functions can have separate working norms including the one for performance.

Efficient management of input materials is of utmost importance in a business organization for maximizing materials productivity, which ultimately adds to the profitability of the organization. This requires well coordinated approach towards various issues involving decision making with respect to materials. All the materials related activities such as material planning & indenting, purchase systems & procedure, variety reduction through standardization & rationalization, reducing uncertainties in demand & supply, handling & transportation,
inspection, proper storage & issue of materials to the internal customers, inventory management, vendor management & finally disposal of obsolete, surplus & scrap materials etc. taken together is termed as Integrated Materials Management.

For example , while inventory manager would like to have minimum level of inventory to show of his performance , Purchasing manager would like to place bulk orders in order to lessen his work load and show discounts as reductions. Both of these acts may be little contradictory from the organisational point of view. That is if some of the functions were to be handled separately, a conflict of interests may occur.

Therefore, the conflicting objectives need to be balanced and intertwined from a total organisational viewpoint so as to achieve optimum results for the organisation as a whole. In an integrated set up, one materials manager (usually the chief) is responsible for all such inter related functions and he is in a position to exercise control and coordinate all the activities with a view to ensure proper balance of the conflicting objectives of the individual functions. Integration also attains the synergetic advantage in terms of eliminating water tight compartments that set in in a disjointed environment of working. The resulting benefits can be seen in terms of rapid transfer of data, through effective and informal communication channels. This is crucial as the materials management function involves handling

vast amount of data. Therefore, integrating the various functions identify themselves to a common materials management department which in turn results in greater coordination and better control. Now a days , in many tradition bound companies too, even the spare part planning which hitherto was done by the operation people has been brought under the umbrella of an Integrated materials Management. Better accountability ,better coordination , better performance, better adaptability to EDP are some of the tangible advantages of the Integrated Materials Management besides a perceptible team spirit , morale and cooperation are the intangible gains. Training and development of staff and executive through rotation of people is another great advantage because of a bigger canvas produced by integration of Materials function.

Marketing Management MARKETING MIX of Caf Coffee Day (CCD): Product: CCD product mix constitutes a wide range of products that appeal primarily to Indian coffee and snack lovers. Products have a decided Indian taste to it be it food or coffee. Most of the eatables have been adopted to meet the Indian taste buds like samosa, biryani, masala sandwich, tikka sandwich etc. Thus they have been trying to capture the Indian taste along with classic coffee. The best selling item in summer is frappe, which is coffee and ice cream blended together. The young people favor it. In winter it is cappuccino. Their merchandising includes funky stuff like t-shirts, caps etc. Price: Considering that CCD knows its major customer lies in the bracket of 1529,it has tried to derive a policy whereby it can satisfy all its customers. The price for a cup of coffee ranges from Rs.45 to Rs 80. From the time it first started its operations, there has been only minor changes in the pricing policy of CCD. Place: The strategy CCD has adapted is to place a cafe in every possible location where some business can be generated. This is a prime factor in determining the success of a retail chain. CCD looks to cater to their target market with strategically located

outlets. Their outlets are generally located in High Street/ Family Entertainment Centers, near Colleges etc . Promotion: CCD is involved in all the areas of serious consumer passion like: Television: CCD does tie up with various TV shows like on Zee English called Friends, with Channel [V]s Get Gorgeous contest. Tie-ups: Above and beyond CCD also tie up lot of the youth brands. So they have a contest going on with Levis, another one with Scooty, Liril, latest one with Airtel Friends. Association with movies: CCD can be seen in movies like Khakhee and Mai Hoon Na Sales Promotion: CCD uses special Caf Citizen Card for rewarding CCDs customers. It is a loyalty program to gain new customers and keep hold of the existing ones. Process: The ordering and delivery process in CCD was earlier based on self- service. But now in most its coffee shops the waiter comes and takes away the order and delivers the order on table. Physical evidence: a) Logo, image, brand: Caf Coffee Day has used bright red and green colors in its logo. RED stands for leadership, vitality, passion for coffee. The GREEN stroke harks back the coffee plantations that they own. Caf is noticeably larger in the logo to denote that Caf Coffee Day pioneered the caf concept in India way back in 1996.The font looks as though the letters have congealed out of a liquid. b) Architecture and Decor: Largely wood and granite based interior with young colours of today, like lime green, yellow, orange, and purple predominate. c) Literature: The literature provided by Caf Coffee Day is indicative of its youthful image. The menus, posters, pamphlets are all designed to attract young and young at heart

Hewlett Packard Marketing Mix

The Hewlett-Packard Company was originated in January 1939 by Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard, two Stanford University classmates. The company incorporated in 1947. Mr. Packard was appointed as the President and Mr. Hewlett as the Vice President.

Product

Hewlett Packard provides infrastructure technology, business process outsourcing, technology support and maintenance, networking products and resources, application development and support, consulting and integration services; enterprise information technology infrastructure, and software, as well as personal computing and related access devices, imaging and printing related products and services. In 2007 HP introduced the Touch Smart PC, an all-in-one PC with a touch-screen display; HP also introduced a touch-screen consumer tablet PC. In 2008 In April, HP introduced a full-function, mini-notebook: the HP 2133 Mini-Note PC. designed for the education market. Hewlett Packard produces Pro Liant, described as an affordable, entry-level rack and tower server ideal for small to medium businesses, workgroups, remote sites, and high-performance computing environments. HP product inventory also includes iPaq Glisten Smart phones, with features such as the ability to schedule meetings, email and text, send photos and manage a contact list. Hewlett Packard Home Networking Products such as the Linksys WRT54G2 Wireless-G router which provides a high-speed Internet connection with several computers.

Price

In 2003 Hewlett Packard introduced another first in pay-per-use utility pricing by offering automated technology that can measure the percent utilization of each central processing unit (CPU) on HP Superdome servers, thereby offering significant advantages to customers during slow periods so they do not pay for processing they do not utilize.

Hewlett seeks to design products with features and esthetics aimed specifically at consumers. It will first estimate how much consumers will pay, then design products to sell at that price.

Promotion

HP launched a branding initiative called, One Voice, to better integrate its vast line of consumer electronics and computer hardware products. HP uses many vehicles to tout its business solutions products and services, including a website with videos and navigation by sorted by business application. Key Hewlett Packard employees host blogs covering topics such as networking, servers, enterprises software and storage. Hewlett Packard employs a Trade-in Programa whereby a customer can get a free quote on an old product and trade it in on eligible products. Hewlett Packard is offering limited time 0% financing on qualifying products and services.

People

Hewlett Packard has approximately 321,000 employees. Mark V. Hurd is the chairman, president and chief executive officer. Hewlett Packard provides a career development website to help guide its upwardly mobile employees.

What is Marketing Research? Meaning

According to Philip Kotler Marketing research is a systematic problem analysis, model building and fact finding for the purpose of improved decision-making and control in the marketing of goods and services. Marketing Research has two words, marketing and research. 1. 2. Marketing means buying and selling activities. Research means a systematic and complete study of a problem. It is done by experts. It uses scientific methods.

Marketing Research is a systematic method of collecting, recording and analyzing of data, which is used to solve marketing problems. A company faces many marketing problems. It faces problems about consumers, product, market competition, sales promotion, etc. Marketing research helps to solve these problems. Marketing research is a systematic process. It first collects data (information) about the marketing problem. Secondly, it records this data. Then it analysis (studies) this data and draws conclusions about it. After that, it gives suggestions (advice) for solving the marketing-problem. So, marketing research helps to solve the marketing problems quickly, correctly and systematically. Marketing research collects full information about consumers. It finds out the needs and expectations of the consumers. So the company produces the goods according to the needs and expectations of the consumers. Marketing research helps the company to make its production and marketing policies. It helps the company to introduce new products in the market. It helps to identify new-markets. Like the Laco Industries wanted to launch a baby shampoo product in India, which is mainly for the urban customers living in developed cities. Laco Industries has conducted its market research in the tier II cities in India and after studying the market survey reports they have launched its product in those markets. Marketing research also collects full information about the competitors. The company uses this information to fight competition. It also helps the marketing manager to take decisions. Marketing research is a special branch and soul of 'Marketing Management'. It is of recent origin and widely used by manufacturers, exporters, distributors and service organisations. Marketing research is very systematic, scientific, objective and organised. It has a wide scope. It includes product research, consumer research, packaging research, pricing research, etc. Marketing research is a continuous process. It has a few limitations. However, a company cannot survive and succeed without it.

The marketing manager has to take many decisions. For this, he requires a lot of data. Marketing research provides correct and up-to-date data to the marketing manager. This helps him to take quick and correct decisions. Therefore, marketing research is an important tool for decision-making. As the new product of Laco Industries is a baby shampoo, of which target customers shall be mostly from urban areas. Baby shampoo shall not be accepted in rural markets of India and that is why they have preferred tier II cities to run its market research and decided to launch its product in those cities only after completing its market research. Laco has rightly selected the tier II cities as their product will get proper demand in tier II and above cities only. While conducting an effective market research for their product Laco Industries must have gone through the basic characteristics of a good effective market research. 1. Effective marketing research uses the principles of the scientific method observation, hypothesis, prediction, and testing. Since the goal of conducting a marketing research project is to uncover useful information, how one should conduct his or her research is vitally important. Good research follows this standard process.

2. Good marketing research develops innovative ways to solve a problem. This requires some level of creativity in your research. Other than traditional methods such as surveys and polls, in what various ways can the problem be evaluated? Are the market researchers even studying the right problem? 3. Reliable marketing research uses multiple methods to acquire data and shy away from over-reliance on any one method. In the market research, the researcher always has to make sure that they adopt the research to the problem. In other words, they shouldnt say that they want to do a survey and then to figure out a problem to solve. Also, they shouldnt be fooled into thinking that one method is better than others. Good research recognizes the value of using multiple methods and sources to achieve reliable information. 4. Savvy marketing researchers recognize the interdependence of research models and the data collected. The research model chosen by the researchers will ultimately determine the type of information, its validity, and their ability to act based on findings. Therefore, the market researchers always base their research efforts on solid models that are clearly defined and as explicit as possible. 5. Smart marketers understand the relationship between the value of information and its cost. There are always lots of questions to be asked and problems to be solved. However, to custodian resources effectively, marketers need to consider the cost of market research, the value of the information gathered, and the likelihood of managements ability or willingness to act on such information. 6. Good marketing researchers show little reliance upon glib or stereotyped assumptions made by managers about how a market works. Often times, those in the midst of a market are unable to clearly see the market. The forest through the trees scenario applies here. 7. Responsible marketing research is a win-win-win situation. It shows a healthy respect for the company, the product and the customers and never tries to harm or take advantage of customers.