Various descriptive questions which you can expect:

 What differences in the retail environment may justify the fact that the fast-moving
consumer goods supply chain in India has far more distributors than in the United
States?
 Demand for hairdressers is much higher over the weekend, when people are not at
work. What revenue management techniques can be used by such a business?
 Are manufacturer's better candidates for IT enablement than service organizations?
Why or why not?
 How has globalization made strategic fit even more important to company's success?
 How can a firm use pricing to change demand patterns?
 Consider the supply chain involved when a customer purchases a book at a Book-
Store. Identify the cycles in this supply chain and the location of the push/pull
boundary.
 What are some obstacles to creating a flexible workforce? What are the benefits?
 Consider the supply chain involved when a customer purchases a book at a Book-
Store. Identify the cycles in this supply chain and the location of the push/pull
boundary.
 "In the era of outsourcing, third party logistics can add value to existing supply
chains". Explain this statement with examples.
 What is the impact of lack of co-ordination on the performance of a supply chain?
 Explain the differing levels of supply chain maturity obtaining in different regions of
the world as a prerequisite to understanding operation of global supply chains.
 How could a grocery retailer use inventory to increase the responsiveness of the
company's supply chain?
 Motorola has gone from manufacturing all its cell phones in-house to almost
completely outsourcing the manufacturing. What are the pros and cons of the two
approaches?
 a) Lists the various stages in the value chain in a company? How should a company
achieve very good strategic fit between its competitive and supply chain strategies?

b) How would you characterize the competitive strategy of a high end department
store like BIG BAZAR? What are the various key customer needs that BIG BAZAR
aims to fill?
 "There are many possible structures for supply chain, but the simplest view has
materials converging on an organization through tiers of suppliers and products
diverging through tiers of customers". Elaborate.
 a) Where are quantity discounts justified in a supply chain? What is the difference
between lot size-based and volume-based quantity discounts?