Category Archives: Supply Chain Issues

Intel’s lowered forecasts for chip revenues and supply chain impact

Posted on September 11, 2012 by aviyer2010

An article in the New York Times (September 9,2012) describes Intel’s lowered revenue forecasts as orders from OEMs like HP and Dell soften. The company had bet on sales growth of ultrabooks, which are between tablets and laptops. But OEMs … Continue reading →

Posted in Operations Management, Supply Chain Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Apple cuts chip orders to Samsung

Posted on September 11, 2012 by aviyer2010

An article in the New York Times (September 9,2012) claims that Apple has cut orders for memory chips sourced from its long time supplier, Samsung. Current patent disputes regarding the similarity of Samsung’s phone and the iphone have caused friction … Continue reading →

Posted in Global Contexts, Operations Management, Supply Chain Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The potential supply chain impact of eliminating agency pricing for ebooks

Posted on September 11, 2012 by aviyer2010

An article in the Wall Street Journal (September 8,2012) describes a settlement by a set of publishers and the department of justice and elimination of the scheme whereby publishers set retail prices and paid a percent of retail price go … Continue reading →

Posted in Operations Management, Service Operations, Supply Chain Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Health care waste in the US estimated at $750 billion

Posted on September 11, 2012 by aviyer2010

A report released by the Institute for Medicine in September 2012, titled “Best Health Care at lower Cost:The Path to Continuously Learning Health Care in America” , suggests that the US health care system had 30% of wasted expense or … Continue reading →

Posted in Operations Management, Service Operations, Supply Chain Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The high cost impact of choices made for the GM Volt hybrid vehicle

Posted on September 10, 2012 by aviyer2010

An article by Reuters (September 10, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/10/us-generalmotors-autos-volt-idUSBRE88904J20120910) describes General Motors as losing $ 49,000 on each Volt it builds. The costs are due to developmnt and tooling costs, number of unique parts in the battery pack and motor as … Continue reading →

Posted in Operations Management, Supply Chain Issues, Sustainability | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Protocol Diversity slows wireless home energy management

Posted on September 7, 2012 by aviyer2010

An article in the New York Times (September 5, 2012) describes the slow adoption of software controlled wireless technologies to manage home energy usage and blames it on protocol diversity. Protocols refer to the codes used by devices to communicate, … Continue reading →

Posted in Operations Management, Supply Chain Issues, Sustainability | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The reported 8471 % markup for drugs in the US

Posted on September 7, 2012 by aviyer2010

A report released on July 25, 2012 by staff in the US Senate committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, examined the gray market for prescription drugs and why hospitals are forced to pay extremely high prices for some drugs. One … Continue reading →

Posted in Operations Management, Service Operations, Supply Chain Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Too few countries producing staple crops and associated risk

Posted on September 7, 2012 by aviyer2010

An article in the New York Times (September 7,2012) describes food price increases of 10% from June to July 2012, corn and wheat price increases of 25% and soybean price increases of 17%. The reason – drought in the US … Continue reading →

Posted in Global Contexts, Operations Management, Supply Chain Issues, Sustainability | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Civil disobedience, Rare earth processing and supply chains

Posted on September 7, 2012 by aviyer2010

An article in the New York Times (September 6, 2012) describes plans by two NGOs in Malaysia, Himpunan Hijau and Save Malaysia Stop Lynas, to protest a plan by Lynas, a materials processor, to start rare earth processing in a … Continue reading →

Posted in Global Contexts, Operations Management, Supply Chain Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

China slowdown and supply uncertainty for outsourcers

Posted on September 7, 2012 by aviyer2010

An opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal (September 7, 2012) describes supply issues faced by US companies that outsource manufacturing to plants in China. Some companies face demands for more money to buy raw materials, others find the company … Continue reading →

Posted in Global Contexts, Operations Management, Supply Chain Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment