Research Articles Base: Manufacturing Companies

Hong Kong manufacturing companies

Q: In the past few decades, the majority of Hong Kong’s manufacturing companies have grown from traditional small factories with fewer than 100 employees in Hong Kong to large manufacturing operations in China with more than 1000 employees. Select a company in Hong Kong that has expanded in the manner described above; and use the conceptual frameworks presented to analyse in detail the company respect to (a) what strategic direction it has taken(horizontal, vertical, diversification) and; (b) what competitive strategy the company has pursued (cost-based, diversification or focus) In your answer, please be specific with respect to strategic direction, market structure, conduct-performance analysis and strategies to be recommended.   Introduction             Hong Kong manufacturing companies have always been keen on finding ways to lower production costs in order to achieve competitive advantage not just in the domestic but also the world market. These Hong Kong companies direct operations based on the core objective of every business organization to achieve competitive advantage or gain an edge over its competitors in the industry. Competitive advantage exists “when a firm successfully formulates and implements a value-creating strategy” (Hitt, Ireland & Hoskisson 2003, p. 6).  Two forms of competitive advantage exist, which are cost advantage and differentiation advantage. Cost advantage exists when the business firm is able to sell its products at a lower price relative to firms selling the same product (Porter 1998). In terms of business strategy, Porter (1980) identifies three generic strategies, which business firms may apply to establish a strong position for the firm by leveraging on its strengths. In optimizing the strengths of the firm, it is able to achieve any of these strategies: cost leadership, differentiation and focus. Cost leadership refers to being the producer with the lowest cost in the industry for a certain level of quality.  Differentiation pertains to the development and production of unique products and services valued by customers. Focus refers to focusing on a narrow segment of the market and implementing either cost leadership or differentiation. Company Background             WKK Industries, Ltd. with main office on Kowloon, Hong Kong has been in operation for more than ten years. The company provides both original equipment manufacturing and original design manufacturing services. WKK serves as the manufacturing division for customers, producing a wide array of high quality products in both small and large volumes and providing all component needs and subassembly services including packaging and shipping. Around 20 percent of the company sales are attributed to original design manufacturing. Customers communicate their conceptual designs and specifications and WKK finalizes the design and printed circuit board assembly. (Kelly & Boulton 1997)               WKK has long-term business relations with Japanese clients. The company finalized the design and manufactured Sega colour LCD games, Universal remote controllers, Casio calculators, NEC colour printer boards, and 486 motherboards, Yamaha hi-fis, cable television decoder, Seiko and Kenwood cordless telephones, Sharp’s PDA parts and CD-ROM cards, 16-bit Sega Genesis, among others. The company has been continuously ISO 9001 certified. (Kelly & Boulton 1997)              WKK has operations in Hong Kong and China, with the China factory moved to a bigger site in 1997. In China, there are five operating groups, which are digital/game, audio, and SMT as well as personnel and administration, and engineering. China operations handle production while Hong Kong takes care of research and development, quality assurance and marketing. When the Shajin factory in China was opened, WKK sent 31 managers, engineers and supervisors from Hong Kong and hired 6 managers, 58 engineers, 41 staff, and 1,679 labourers and 135 quality inspectors. The assembly operations run in one shift while the surface mount technology runs 24 hours everyday. At the time that production was moved to China in 1994, the average monthly salary of engineers in China is 5 relative to ,055 in Hong Kong while the average monthly wage of labourers in China is relative to 5 in Hong Kong. There is also a 50 percent turnover rate in China implying a huge labour pool that lowers the cost of labour. (Kelly & Boulton 1997)         Strategic Analysis of the Company Strategic Direction of the Company             WKK strategic decision to move its manufacturing operations to China and retain the Hong Kong operations to cover R&D, quality assurance and marketing is described as horizontal integration. This type of strategic direction refers to the expansion of the business at the same level of the value chain particularly covering internal expansion (Clemente & Greenwood 1998). By moving its production operations to China, WKK was able to expand its manufacturing capacity so that it is able to meet more demand at less cost. The internal expansion to China has benefited the company in different ways. First is through economies of scale. Through its horizontal strategic direction, the company is now able to produce more products at the same cost relative to its previous production in Hong Kong. Second is through economies of scope. WKK is able to optimize its resources not only in terms of labour but also in relation to raw materials and other resources needed in production. Third is through increased market power due to the heightened capacity of the company to meet greater demand even if the services demanded may be original equipment or original design making it an attractive firm for suppliers due to potential increase in raw material needs and customers requiring greater amounts of production for their equipment and designs. Fourth is through cost minimization since the lower cost of skilled and unskilled labour, land and raw materials in China enables the company to reduce production cost by as much as 30 to 50 percent. The savings enables the company to increase its concentration on research and development and marketing. The effectiveness of its chosen strategy is reflected in its performance after it moved production to China and boosted its R&D capability. The SMT production unit was able to manufacture eight Yamaha products with an assembly time of .03 to .04 seconds for every component, five Kyushu Matsushita Electric product lines at the rate of .15 seconds for every component for a daily run of more than 1,500 units a day. The lesser cost of labour enabled the company to equip the factory with ten stand-alone machines to do batch production. The factory has Genrad, Tescon Point and Test Research machines for information and communications technology requirements. The Shajin factory in China also manufactures 9,000 Casio calculators everyday. WKK’s manufacturing processes adopts the management methods as well as the innovative assembly practices pervasive in Japan.        The production performance of the Shajin factory in China implies that the company can simultaneously manufacture different products for different customers, which entails the high level of innovativeness and efficiency of the company in terms of management, production processes and production resources.   Competitive Strategy of the Company             WKK applies the cost-based competitive strategy. This industry leadership strategy involves a business firm’s goal of becoming a low cost producer relative to competitors. Ideally, a business firm either can sell its products at the average industry price to gain a higher profit compared to the other high-cost producing firms or it can sell its products at lower than the average price to draw a larger market share. In the event of a price war, the business firm still gains the price advantage of the other firms cannot match its price without incurring losses so that in the long run the company still holds cost leadership. (Porter 1980)             WKK has gained cost advantage in several ways. First is through the enhancement of process efficiencies through strong management leadership and innovative organization of its factory supply chain processes. The company has both managers and engineers from Hong Kong and China to ensure continuity with improvement in the strategic management objectives of the company and the sharing of expertise. This lowers cost by minimizing mistakes that increases cost in terms of raw material wastage and manufacturing delays. Second is through access to large sources of resources or avoiding unnecessary costs. The company was able lower its cost at a significant level by incurring lower costs for the land and factory structure, labour, and other operating costs.                  Through its strategies, WKK was able to maintain Japanese customers, who are leaders in their industries, as its biggest market resulting to the company’s access to technology and other innovations.  The company is seeking to expand to other markets such as North America and Europe.           Recommendations             Cost-based strategy also has pitfalls. One is the possibility that through technological innovations a competing firm may be able to lower its production cost to either match the price of the company or offer a lower price levelling down the competitive advantage of the company. This risk is a challenge to all Hong Kong businesses that opted to apply cost-based strategy through outsourcing because their competitors in other regions commonly focus on technological advantage. Thus, although WKK is channelling some of its saved resources from the lowered production cost to research and development and quality assurance, it should become aggressive in attaining a technological advantage. In the long run, this would increase its capability and further increase cost. The company should also capitalize on technology sharing with its customers in terms of product development and manufacturing techniques to enhance its operations. Another risk of cost-based strategy is the possibility that competing firms applying the focus strategy would gain a hold over a specified segment of the market and maintain their market share through lower cost by operating in a narrow scope allowing them to gain expertise in the area. WKK offers production services to its customers, regardless of the original equipment or design ordered. On one hand, this is an advantage for the company because customers with specific demands can rely upon the company to deliver its particular order in bulk. On other hand, this prevents the company from honing its expertise for a particular product line, an advantage that focus-based companies have. WKK may divide its production into the manufacturing of particular products and custom-made products to boost the capability of the company to meet focused and specialized demand. References Clemente, MN & Greenwood, DS 1998, Winning at Mergers and Acquisitions: The           Guide to Market-Focused Planning and Integration, John Wiley & Sons, New  York.   Hitt, MA, Ireland, RD & Hoskisson, RE 2003, Strategic Management: Competitiveness    and Development, 5th edn, Thompson South-Western, Australia   Kelly, M & Boulton, W 1997, WTEC Panel Report on the Electronics Manufacturing in    the Pacific Rim, International Technology Research Institute, Baltimore, \     Maryland.    Porter, ME 1980, Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Strategies and Competitors, Free Press, New York.   Porter, ME 1998, Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior           Performance, Free Press, New York.     Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

Hong Kong manufacturing companies

Q: In the past few decades, the majority of Hong Kong’s manufacturing companies have grown from traditional small factories with...

Sample VIM AB Developed Manufactured Marketed and sold Household Sewing Machines Essay

VIM AB developed, manufactured, marketed and sold household sewing machines. Electronic and computerized models were manufactured at the Husqvarna plant in Sweden, while low-priced mechanical machines and over-lockers were sourced from Asian manufacturers. When Santa Rehnquist came to VIM, much of his work was directed towards improving the company’s market orientation. The number of concurrent changes in the company made for a window of opportunity to redirect the strategic focus of the company. An intense weekend meeting in April 1997 marked the beginning of a very busy period for the top management team. Mr. Rehnquist explained: We started off with a week-end meeting on a country resort. I didn’t even bring in a consultant this time. I have done that in the past, but this time I was so fresh on the job that I was the one who could ask all those `stupid’ questions. During the first meeting, the basic scope of the strategy document was laid out while further refinements and changes were made during the summer of 1997. The new mission statement3 and the companion strategy document were presented to middle management in a series of seminars. The opportunity to participate in the strategy process was a new experience to most of the people involved. Some took a dim view of the amount of time spent away from more pressing matters such as low sales or the installation of a new accounting system. Nevertheless, the high involvement 3 Please refer to the mission statement in the Appendix. Case Study 12 VSM.rtf 3 Case Study 12 VSM.rtf seemed to pay off. The strategy document was often referred to for guidance on operational matters and the mission statement was frequently promoted in the company’s public relations. The physical appearance of the strategy document was very plain; it consisted of folded and stapled photocopies wrapped in a two-color sleeve. This was a reflection of the concern that the VIM management had about setting in stone something that was inherently an ongoing process. The strategic conversation within the top management team continued with at least five off-site workshops a year, formally dedicated to assessing the company’s current strategic position. Summing up this initial process, Mr. Rehnquist said: The first attempts were very unstructured and people were complaining about how it was all empty phrases and buzz words. My point is that, it is only when you engage in that type of discussion that you may come to realize that your thoughts aren’t that clear after all. Making it happen Retailers were very important to VIM in their new plans for future profitability. This crucial link to the customers became a targeted area for VIM with the arrival of the new CEO. One important effort in this direction was the programmed to transform the retailers into `Dealer- Partners’.4 The concept included extended support for business development to encourage them to carry the Husqvarna Viking product line exclusively. Marketing Director Sofia Axels son put it this way: There have been tremendous changes in VIM since Santa [Rehnquist] came here, there really have. But we may change all we want; the customer only meets the retailer and as long as the retailer doesn’t change, the customer won’t perceive any change at all. In the US, VIM started to cooperate with Jo-Ann Fabrics & Crafts, a large retailer of fabrics with over a thousand stores nationwide, setting up small sewing machine outlets inside their fabric 4 Vim’s name for exclusive retailers under special contracts.   Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

Sample VIM AB Developed Manufactured Marketed and sold Household Sewing Machines Essay

VIM AB developed, manufactured, marketed and sold household sewing machines. Electronic and computerized models were manufactured at the...

Sample It Manufactures and Produces a Variety of Products Essay

Strategic Business Analysis: Procter & Gamble Case Study   Overview of the Company:             Procter & Gamble is one of the most successful companies in the industry today. It manufactures and produces a variety of products that features not only high standard of quality, but practicality and value for money as well. was founded by William Procter, a candle maker, and James Gamble, a soap maker in 1873. By 1879, they have developed Ivory, an inexpensive while soap, thus, enabling them to establish their own laboratory, being the first in the United States. By 1930, the company was able to purchase a British soap manufacturer, Thomas Hedley & Sons, and by 1935, it was able to establish a factory in the Philippines.             At present, Procter & Gamble sells more than 300 leading brands, such as Pampers, Ariel, Tide, Whisper, Pringles, Downy, Camay, Cover Girl, Pantene, Aims, Crest, Duracell, Puffs, Secret, Walla, Eukanuba, Bounty, Folgers, Gilette, Hugo Boss, Mr. Clean, Oral-B, Old Spice, Clairol, Actonel, Lacoste, Joy, Max Factor, Zest, and Olay. It markets its products to over 160 countries worldwide, and operates a total of 115 plants in more than 80 countries all over the world. Its headquarters are located in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. It employs more than 98,000 employees worldwide. Aside from a wide variety of products, Procter & Gamble has also been active in producing radio and television shows, such as Dawson’s Creek, Shirley Jones and Down to Earth (“Procter and Gamble”, 2007).             The global business units of the company is divided into five, namely, fabric and home care, being its biggest division, beauty care, the second biggest, baby and family care, health care, and snacks and beverages. The fabric and home care division of the company is its most profitable division, contributing to a total of .1 billion in 2004.             However, the increasing number of competitor companies forced Procter & Gamble to implement far-reaching initiatives that aim to produce changes in terms of the company’s organizational culture, work processes, culture, production, and operations. Procter & Gamble are aiming at this through its implementation of ‘Organization 2005’, which would enable the company to strengthen its global presence.  As such, this paper aims to make an analysis of the business strategies of Procter & Gamble, including its strengths and weaknesses as a company. It also aims to evaluate and assess the performance of the company, based on a specific period, until the implementation of its new business strategy. In this regard, the latest business strategy of the company, ‘Organization 2005’ would be analyzed and evaluated.   TASK 1 Identification of Organizational Strengths and Weaknesses             One of the potential strengths of Procter & Gamble is the wide variety of products, following the five different business segments the company is offering its consumers. The wide variety of products the company offers its consumers enabled the company to operate in almost 200 countries worldwide, thus, strengthening the second potential strength of the company, which is establishing a dominant market position. The dominance of the products and the name of the company in the market and among consumers help the company to become a stable reputation in the market, being an already known and established manufacturer of products in the industry. It has been reported that companies achieve marketplace distinction through their size and dominance, and such advantages can be achieved through a combination of brand-name recognition, accessibility, capacity, broad expertise, and the ability to create advantage through sheer marketplace muscle (Bacon and Pugh, 2003). These characteristics contributed to the strengths and market advantage of the company. Another potential strength of the company is its continuous modification of structure and internal processes, which aims to maximize its global advantage. Through continuous modification and restructuring, the company is able to adapt to the continuous changes that are happening both internally and externally. Because changes in the business sector are continuous, a certain international and multinational company must be able to have different approaches in order to cope with such changes. Another potential strength of the company is its ability to launch various initiatives to facilitate knowledge exchange and best practices in the company, leading to the strengthening of the Organization 2005 initiative. This emphasizes the highly effective value chain of the company, being able to facilitate the exchange of knowledge and information, thus, enhancing the company’s ability to transfer best ideas, assemblies, parts, and process data that can be easily and readily shared (Martinez and Scherer, 2006). Facilitating best practices and knowledge exchange in the company enables it to reinforce its next potential strength, which is improving and developing its workforce through IT initiatives, reward systems, supply chain management, and training programs. In this regard, the company is able to develop the potentials, skills, talents, and knowledge of its employees, thus, helping them to become empowered and more motivated. However, despite its strengths, several weaknesses can also be determined. One of the weaknesses of Procter & Gamble is that its implementation of new strategies involves substantial and significant costs. Additional costs for the company would enable it to allocate larger amounts of money, thus, contributing to the additional problems of the company. In this regard, significant allocation and budgeting must be adjusted in order to cope with additional costs. Another weakness of the company is the retrenchment being done, thus, affecting the morale of employees. Due to cost cutting, an organization may have the option to retrench, relocate or even fire their employees to be able to cope with the needed changes being faced by the company. However, because of such actions, many employees would be threatened, not only in terms of their performance in the company, but in their individual skills and abilities as well. In this regard, this is being treated as a weakness of the company, as it provides fear and anxiety to employees, being included in the retrenchment and job reduction initiatives. Another weakness is the company’s ability for lower realization. Lower realization means the inability of the company to think about the different problems and solutions that might be implemented. In this regard, low realization of the company entails inaction and passive approach in terms of problems and challenges. The next significant weakness of the company involves the leadership and management skills of , who puts too much pressure on the managers of Procter and Gable for marketing their products. This means that the leadership and management style of the company’s past CEO does not fit the corporate culture of the company. It has been reported that leadership is regarded as the most important element of directing the function of management, and a supportive function to other managerial functions, thus, in this regard, good leadership is important to effective management (2004). The lack of good leadership on the part of  has contributed to the weaknesses of the company, as his strategic decisions are out of timing, leading to more problems for the company. In addition, his decisions for employee transfers and relocations resulted to employee behavioral problems. As such, these weaknesses further contribute to the problems of the company in terms of lower sales and profits and lower market recognition during the period from 1995 to 1999.         Identification of Organizational Opportunities and Threats             To complete the analysis of the performance of the company, both its opportunities and threats are needed to be recognized. The major opportunity of Procter & Gamble is the taking over of  being the company’s CEO. The new management of focused on taking new initiatives in underdeveloped markets, thus, focusing and prioritizing the market profitability of top-selling brands. The dominance of the products and the reputation of the company dictate its advantage in the market, being established and stable in the industry. As the pioneer in a product or market segment, Procter & Gamble has a large installed base of their products or numerous facilities in key locations (Bacon and Pugh, 2003), thus, enabling the company to obtain relevant information regarding a certain target market. Another potential opportunity for the company is its ability for the improvement of operations, profitability and rebuilding its management team, which are essential factors in improving its competitiveness and in revitalizing its long-term growth. This was done by the company through IT initiatives and investment, through improvement and development of workforce, and through introduction of new products and new technologies. The continuous improvement and development of the IT industry in many countries have provided Procter & Gamble to improve and hasten its operations and production processes, thus, providing larger opportunities for participating in globalization. This is a good opportunity for the company, as it helps increase economic interdependence between countries and leads to an increased flow of goods, capital and knowledge across borders (Ko et al., 2006). Another opportunity for the company is the reduction for overhead and manufacture costs, which would enable the company to allocate more resources to its other functions, and not only in the operations and production departments. Better allocation and budgeting of the company’s resources would provide better savings and monetary advantage for the company, thus, dictating and determining the ability of the company to allocate resources effectively for the benefit of the whole company.             Along with the opportunities are the threats presented to the company, which serve to be the future problems Procter & Gamble is able to face. The primary and main threat to the company and to any other company is the increase in competition. The increase in the competition against Procter & Gamble is the increase in the production of generic brands, which are the cheaper versions of the company’s core products. The increase in competition in the industry was triggered by the lack of introduction of the company for new products for a long time. In this regard, products sit in one place without adding value (Imai, 1997), thus, not enhancing the users themselves. In terms of beauty, home and healthcare products, they must continuously be changed and modified to continuously cater to the changing needs of the consumers. Without the introduction of new products in the market, the consumers would have the notion of stagnation of the company, which would provide realization that the things they do not like about the product would remain all throughout. The next threat for the company is the falling stock prices, from which the prices of the company are dependent upon. Because Procter and Gamble is involved in supplying the needs of its consumers, the prices of its commodities then is dependent on the demand of its consumers. In this regard, if the stock prices or the prices of the commodity would fall, then the overall profit, sales, and operations of the company would be affected, leading to significant drop of earnings. The next threat to the business of the company is the increase in the prices of the costs of raw materials. The increase in the prices of raw materials would provide significant threats to the company, as this significant increase would also affect the pricing of the company’s commodities or products, which would may illicit negative and unwanted responses from consumers. The increase in the prices of raw materials would mean a direct effect or increase in the prices of end-products in the market. Another threat determined is the failure of the company’s dual acquisition, which can be regarded as a waste of time, effort, money and energy. Lastly, one of the most important and significant threat to the company is its internal problems, particularly in its human resources.   TASK 3 A. Acquisition: May or May not be a sensible strategy for a diversified company             Merger or acquisitions are a part of a company’s long-range planning and may be considered as the one of the means of implementing company plans and reaching company objectives (Young, 2003). It presents crucial benefits or advantages, such as increased stability for the two companies involved, employee diversification, expansion, wider target market and market segment, product variety and innovation, and increase in profit and sales. However, mergers and acquisitions may not always be a sensible or reasonable strategy for a diversified company or organization. A diversified company has features of having a diversified culture, language, practices, operations, and management. In a diversified organization, different types of individuals, having diverse cultures, beliefs, and languages can be encountered, thus, making management and leadership a bit challenging. It has been reported that diversified organizations find it difficult to maintain sufficient resources in areas of capital, information, technology, and human resources, involves high cost of management, lack of overall strategy, lack of authority and capability over resource allocation, and difficulty to achieve synergy to benefit the company as a whole (2004). In this regard, for such kinds of organizations, mergers and acquisitions may serve to a great and tough challenge.             Given the different features of a diversified company, the several disadvantages for having a merger or acquisition can be determined. One reason why a merger or acquisition may not be a positive strategy for a diversified organization is the different cultures that exist between the two organizations. In this regard, the difference between the organizational cultures of the two companies may be one of the causes of deeper conflicts and problems, such as language or culture barriers. It has been reported that the lack of human compatibility between the acquirer and the target, and the lack of strategic fit between the companies’ corporate culture is the major driver of the failure of such endeavors (2003). Another reason is that the human and economic resources of the target organization may not be as strategic as it seems, thus, contributing to the burden of the acquirer. In this regard, the acquirer must do extensive research in order to obtain relevant information and data from the target organization.             The third reason for mergers and acquisitions not being a sensible strategy for diversified organizations is the presence of social incompatibility with regards to the aggregate values and beliefs held by the managers and employees of the organization. In this regard, the reputation of the acquirer must be known to have participated in mergers and acquisitions in order to gain the trust of target organizations, and have the sufficient experiences and expertise in terms of acquisitions. Another reason is the acquirer’s lack of internal evaluation and assessment if it really needs an acquisition, or if it really needs to merge with another company. The company may not have the proper evaluation on the needs and the resources of the organization, thus, in reality, not really needing any merger with any organization. In this regard, the organization must be able to assess their performance and resources first before deciding to have a merger with any other company.             The fifth reason why mergers may not be a sensible strategy for diversified organizations is the accumulation and addition of risks, which may have adverse changes in the type of management each organization implements. With mergers, the risks each organization has would be combined, thus, doubling the risks. In this regard, the leadership and the management style of each organization matters, as it dictates and determines the kind and type of culture the members may have. As mentioned earlier, leadership and management are important aspects in the operations of an organization, thus, are essential contributory factors for the failure or success of a particular merger or acquisition process. The last reason is the manufacturing and production process that are employed in both organizations. A diversified organization has a diversified process of production and operations, thus, might entirely affect the process of production and operations of the target company. In the event that the production and operations of the target company are significantly different from the acquirer, then problems and challenges would be encountered. As such, extensive and long-term research activities must be prioritized and facilitated effectively to prevent and avoid merger problems and conflicts, not only to the acquirer but to the target company as well. Such researches can be done through internal and external references, thus, allowing both companies involved in the merger to obtain relevant information and data from each other.            Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

Sample It Manufactures and Produces a Variety of Products Essay

Strategic Business Analysis: Procter & Gamble Case Study Overview of the Company: Procter & Gamble is one of the ...

DEVELOPMENT OF TUTORIAL CASES USING DFMA PRINCIPLES

Proposal   Introduction Product Management is one of the four areas of marketing (). The other three parts of the marketing mix are pricing, promotion, and distribution.  Basically, this paper aims to analyze and determine the effectiveness of DFMA principles in product management. According to  (1980), products designed using DFMA principles have higher quality and reliability than those developed using traditional design methods. According to his research, DFMA also ensures that the transition from the design phase to the production phase is as smooth and rapid as possible. With this regard, this paper aims to conduct a study regarding the effectiveness of DFMA principles in product management. To do this, the researcher will conduct an in-depth investigation to different business organizations in Australia particularly to two shoe manufacturing companies, two wooden containers pallets or packing cases manufacturing companies and two dairy products manufacturing companies. Using these three product cases, this research will determine and identify the effectiveness of DFMA principles resulting to redesign of products. This research proposal discusses in detail the general purpose of the study. Moreover, the objectives of the study and the research statements are presented. Here, vital concepts, questions and assumptions are stated. Finally, the scope and limitation of the study, overview of the methodology used and the significance of the research are discussed.   Statement of the Problem Generally, the purpose of this study is to conduct a study on the effectiveness of DFMA principles to the product development of different business organization in Australia with respect to three different products (i.e. shoes, wood containers and dairy products). This study tries to answer the following queries: 1.                  What are the variables that significantly affect the perception of the costumers regarding satisfaction? 2.                  Does appropriateness of DFMA principles significantly affects the progress of certain organization? 3.                  Does costumer satisfaction contribute to the progress of a certain business organization? 4.                  Is there any significant relationship between the use DFMA principles and organization’s progress?   Hypothesis of the Study Based on the research questions the research project works out on the following null hypotheses: 1.                  The use of DFMA principles has no significant effect to the progress of businesses in Australia. 2.                  Consumer’s perception regarding the use DFMA principles has no significant relationship to the progress of business organizations.   Significance of the Study             This study will be a significant endeavor in understanding the importance of DFMA principles in a certain organization.  This study will be helpful to business administrators and management practitioners for this will be a guide for them when they employ effective product development approach to their organization. By examining the risks and other factors involved in production strategies, business administrators and management practitioners will be able to design measures to minimize the risks. Further, through the understanding of the needs of their consumers in terms of satisfaction, this study will help different manufacturers to satisfy their consumers. Moreover, this study will be a significant endeavor in promoting effective production strategies that suffice the needs of costumers.             This study is deemed useful for future researchers on production strategies and its application to different business organizations.  This study could also serve as an academic tool in informing its reader about the business development and organizational change.  Moreover, this research will provide recommendations on how to value business development as they are taking a large part in the organizations success.  In addition, this study will provide information to business leaders regarding business progress and development. Knowing how consumers perceive development of an organization will assist business leaders in establishing programs, policies, and staff development.     Objectives             The primary objective of this study is to examine and determine the perception of the respondents regarding the use of DFMA principles in product development particularly to companies with the following products: shoes, wood containers and dairy products.  To address this objective, the researcher explores the nature of six (6) business organizations and production and management programs: its benefits and advantages to different consumers. Moreover, this study will focus consumers’ perceptions of production strategies. The objectives of this study will be to: <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 200%"> determine the impact of DFMA principles to six business organizations’ development;</li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 200%"> determine if costumers’ perceptions to the use of DFMA principles has a relationship to their satisfaction towards service/product provided by the six business organizations in Australia; and</li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 200%"> determine if satisfaction of costumers with respect to DFMA principles affects the progress of business organizations in Australia.</li>               Apparently, a survey is conducted to the costumers to determine what attributes affects their criteria in identifying the progress of business organizations in Australia. An interview takes place to know what are their problems and concerns regarding the production programs. Finally, this research comes up with pertinent findings, and provides insightful recommendations on production programs. Theoretical Framework The theoretical framework that will be used in the study is the Input-Process-Output Model. In the IPO model, a process is viewed as a series of boxes (processing elements) connected by inputs and outputs. Information or material objects flow through a series of tasks or activities based on a set of rules or decision points. ( 1997) Flow charts and process diagrams are often used to represent the process. (, 1997) What goes in is the input; what causes the change is the process; what comes out is the output. ( 2001) Figure 1.1 illustrates the basic IPO model:     Figure 1.1 Input – Process – Output Model                       The IPO model will provide the general structure and guide for the direction of the study. Substituting the variables of this study on the IPO model, the researcher came up with the following:           Figure 1.2 Conceptual Framework            INPUT                                PROCESS                           OUTPUT                   Methods Description of the Research Design             For this study, the descriptive research method was utilized. In this method, it is possible that the study would be cheap and quick. It could also suggest unanticipated hypotheses. Nonetheless, it would be very hard to rule out alternative explanations and especially infer causations. Thus, this study used use the descriptive approach. This descriptive type of research utilizes observations in the study.  To illustrate the descriptive type of research,  (1994) guided the researcher when he stated: Descriptive method of research is to gather information about the present existing condition.              The purpose of employing this method is to describe the nature of a situation, as it exists at the time of the study and to explore the cause/s of particular phenomena. The researcher opted to use this kind of research considering the desire of the researcher to obtain first hand data from the respondents so as to formulate rational and sound conclusions and recommendations for the study. To come up with pertinent findings and to provide credible recommendations, this study utilized two sources of research: primary and secondary.  Primary research data were obtained through this new research study. Questionnaire survey and in-depth interview were conducted. On the other hand, the secondary research data were obtained from previous studies on the same topic.  The primary sources of data came from the survey-questionnaire and interviews conducted by the researcher. The secondary sources of data were based on published articles from DFMA principles, business and production development journals, books and related studies on the product management.     Description of the Sample   The general population for this study is composed 66 individuals from different business industries in Australia which are related to the use of DFMA principles and development. Basically, 60 customers of six business industries in Australia (10 respondents per organization) that is engaged to the use of DFMA principles in production practices will be surveyed.  These companies are manufacturers of shoes, wood containers and dairy products. In addition, six administrators (1 administrator per organization) of these companies will be both surveyed and interviewed.   Description of the Instruments To determine the effects of the use of DFMA principles, the researcher prepared a survey-questionnaire. The respondents graded each statement in the survey-questionnaire using a Likert scale (1991) with a five-response scale wherein respondents were given five response choices. The equivalent weights for the answers were:   Range                                                Interpretation       4.50 – 5.00                                        Strongly Agree 3.50 – 4.49                                        Agree 2.50 – 3.49                                        Uncertain 1.50 – 2.49                                        Disagree          0.00 – 1.49                                        Strongly Disagree   The decision was made to use a questionnaire for the data collection for this project due to the sensitivity of the information being obtained.  It is important for the respondents to be open and honest in their responses. The use of the questionnaire provides the project owner with the ability to test the views and attitudes of the managers. The questionnaire was designed to allow the collection of specific information about the participants to conduct statistical analysis, e.g. age, sex, length of business time with the company. In the interview, open-ended questions were used to obtain as much information as possible about how the interviewee feels about the research topic.  Interviews took between one and two hours. The questions being used during the interview have been based on the research questions for this project, they have been reviewed, refined and approved by the project supervisor. The researcher designed a semi-structured interview. Here, the researcher encouraged the interviewee to clarify vague statements and to further elaborate on brief comments. The interviewer did not share his/her own beliefs and opinions.   Statistical Treatment of the Data When the entire survey questionnaire have been collected, the researcher used statistics to analyze all the data; and was assisted by the SPSS in coming up with the statistical analysis for this study. For the interview, a content analysis was drawn in order to identify factors pertaining to the effective/ineffective impact of the use of DFMA principles in production development.   Explanation of Procedures             The project procedure will be broken down into five key stages; problem definition, research design, data collection, analysis of results and presentation findings and recommendations.              The project owner develops the original idea for the research project.  The idea is discussed with the supervisor and other students. The project supervisor then provided guidance on developing the hypotheses and key reference material that would be needed for the project. After the approval of this research proposal, the researcher will review literature pertaining to the topic. Afterwards, significant issues and problems will be identified. The researcher will then start determining the population for the study, following the sampling. For this study, the researcher will focus on the impact of the use of DFMA principles to product development. The researcher will ask the consent of the intended respondents. They will be ensured that their response to the survey and interview will be handled with high confidentiality. The procedures in data gathering will cover three months. The researcher will collate, tally and tabulate the results. A preliminary analysis will be done before submitting the final draft to the supervisor.    Discussion of External Validity             The researcher will attempt to make the sample as representative to the population as possible. The population will be 60 individuals from different business industries in Australia which are related to the use of DFMA principles and development. The study will only cover individuals in Australia. Different organizations will be selected through stratified random sampling so as to have a representative sample in relation to socioeconomic backgrounds. In each organization, ten respondents will be selected through a systematic random sampling.     Discussion of Internal Validity             The researcher will make sure to rule out any threats to the internal validity of the study. The researcher will consider events that occur during the course of the program that might impact the final outcome. In the testing part, the researcher will make sure that the content of the testing instrument used in pretest does not duplicate the posttest. Instead, the researcher will make the content of the posttest reflective of the pretest. Moreover, the researcher is hoping that participants will not drop out from the program. In presenting the findings of the study, the researcher will ask the help of a statistician in interpreting the results of survey and tests.                           Timetable TASK Month   1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th Select topic                   Undertake preliminary literature search                   <ul style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Define research questions </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Write-up aims and objectives </li> </ul>                   Select appropriate methodology and locate sources of information. Confirm access.                   Write-up Dissertation Plan                   Undertake and write-up draft critical literature review.                   Secondary and Primary Data Detailed <ul style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Sources </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Consulted </li> </ul>                   Research Findings: <ul style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Analysed </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Evaluated </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Written-up </li> </ul>                   Discussion: <ul style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Research findings evaluated and discussed in relation to the literature review </li> </ul>                   Methodology written-up (including limitations and constraints)                   Main body of the report written-up and checked for logical structure                   <ul style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Conclusions drawn </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify"> Recommendations made </li> </ul>                   Introduction and Executive Summary written-up                   Final format and indexing                   Print                       References:   Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

DEVELOPMENT OF TUTORIAL CASES USING DFMA PRINCIPLES

Proposal Introduction Product Management is one of the four areas of marketing (). The other three parts of the marketing mix are pri...