Warehouse

In a WMS, we aim to observe the maximized profits with a minimized cost with certain computerized procedures to enable a seamless process of warehouse operation. With the above consideration, we come up with 4 main special features that are essential to be equipped in the WMS. First of all, we need to have barcode labeling for all the stocks in the warehouse in order to identify each product, keep record in the system and find them out easily.

It is necessary for us to have detailed information of every stock in the warehouse by simply identifying the barcode labels with wireless inventory scanner, which could save time, reduce paper work and greatly increase the productivity and accuracy when handling stocks. Barcode labeling is fundamental for WMS as we need to keep tracking the stocks throughout the whole warehouse operation process. Secondly, we think that efficiency is also an undeniable element in WMS, which we consider auto-conveyer as one of our choice of special features to enhance the efficiency.

Auto-conveyor could reduce the need of man power and it is much speedy than the manually controlled way when moving stocks as it could quickly retrieve wanted items. Auto conveyor could also handle some simple sorting and identification work, which greatly reduce the need of manpower. Thirdly, virtual warehouse would be our core feature in the WMS, it acts as an important role in both order management and put away and packing. It provides a comprehensive physical view of the warehouse. With a virtual warehouse, we could have a clear idea of the operating warehouse through the browser.

It could facilitate the decision making in the WMS as we could control a lot of process with a virtual warehouse. Indeed, a virtual warehouse is a system that involved a lot of components, but we are now focusing on the order management and the put away and picking management. With WMS, orders could be generated easily on the internet as the information of customers, suppliers and the stocks are kept in the system. It is convenient to add items, notes and select the customer or supplier for your purchase or sales order.

This may improve the efficiency and is environmentally friendly when compared with the paper file. It is much less time-consuming to find out the order and customer information. For the put away management, the WMS could utilize the optimum locations for the stocks received in the warehouse automatically. Also in the picking management, the WMS could decide the best location for picking. With this system, we do not have to waste time on finding storage location, while having a greater control in the allocation of resources and facilitates time management.

In fact, the virtual warehouse could not work alone, while barcode labeling and auto-conveyor assisted the virtual warehouse a lot in the stance of automation and computerization. They three are interrelated and the virtual warehouse is in the leading position among them, which means it is important in connecting different parts of a warehouse and make the WMS works. Although the above 3 special features has provide us convenience, efficiency and accuracy, we could not fully rely on a computerized system but to have a feature that could reduce our mistakes to the minimum, ideally, zero mistake.

Thus the last feature we include in our WMS is cycle counting. Cycle counting reduces the need for the time-consuming and costly process of shutting down the manufacturing process in order to count inventory, which the inventory auditing procedure is carried out according to a continuous schedule. The result would be a more accurate calculation of stocks in the warehouse. To conclude, we think these four features are able to make a WMS that could control material movement efficiently and most possibly making the maximum profit.

Group Assignment 2 Analysis the Information system support for Sale process of Minh Hieu Mobile company. March – 2013 Table of Contents I. Executive summary3 II. Background of the organization4 III. Description of the business process4 IV. Description of the existing IT/IS to support the process6 V. Analysis of strengths and weakness of the process6 VI. Recommendation6 VII. Implementation Plan8 VIII. Conclusion:9 IX. List of reference:9 I. Executive summary

Purpose of assignment: Analyze the business process of a company, examine the IS use and issues of this company and develop a plan recommending more effective use of information and communication technologies. Selected company: Minh Hieu Mobile company The analyzed business process : Sale process What we have done: Collect the information about the company; discuss with Sale manager of the company to understand the organization and management system of the company essay writer magic; apply the knowledge of information system management to analyze the business and recommendation for improvement of the information system of the company.

Group members: * Nguyen Thanh Ngoc * Tran Hong Nhung * Do Van Linh * Mai Hoang Oanh * Tong Thi Ngoc Quynh * Bui Khanh Son * Nguyen Thi Bich Hang II. Background of the organization Name of the company: Minh Hieu mobile Ltd. (Minh Hieu Mobile) Minh Hieu Mobile Limited is a small mobile trading company established in 2010 and located in Ha Noi city. At present, the company has more than 20 employees and has 3 mobile showrooms in Dong Da district, Hai Ba Trung district and Thanh Xuan district of Hanoi. The scope of services for Minh Hieu Mobile includes: Selling mobile and accessories, mobile repair services.

Due to the small of scale, the management and the organization of the company is very simple with two departments is Sale – Purchase and Accounting. The Sale department is responsible for managing 3 showrooms. Figure 1: Organization structure of Minh Hieu Mobile company Director Sale – Purchase Accounting Showroom 1 Showroom 2 Showroom 3 III. Description of the business process According to the information provided by Sale managers, we understand the Sale process of the company as below: Showrooms are equipped computer and internet to support for business, each showroom is operating almost independently.

There is some limitation of communication and exchange of information between showrooms of Minh Hieu mobile. Normally, at the end of the day, the head of showroom makes a sale report and sends to Sale Manager and Accounting department via email. After that, based on the report, Sale and Accounting update into the Accounting system and Warehouse for monitoring the inventory and finance. The Figure 2 illustrates the process for purchasing a mobile from a Minh Hieu’s store If a customer request to buy a mobile, the sale staff firstly checks if the mobile is in the how-case. In case the mobile is not in the show-case, the sale staff will check to warehouse of the showroom. If the product is available, the sale staff will deliver the mobile to the customer, then bill and print the invoice. The mobile will be received by the customer and he/she will bring it to technical staff for setup then it is all set. If the mobile is not available on the shelves, the sale staff will check the warehouse. If the warehouse has this mobile, the sale staff will give a delivery order to the warehouse to get the mobile and deliver to customer.

If the mobile is out of stock, the sale staff will ask if the customer wants to order this item. If customer agrees, the sale staff prepares the order, sets up an appointment to customer and requests the Sale department to import the mobile. Take request Search shelves Avaiable? Delivery and billing by the clerk Deliver to the cashier on the end-day Propose warehouse Get from warehouse Search in wearhose?? Able to order? Go to another store Notify customer Return to store Place order Customer Clerk Customer Purchase and setup the phone

Take phone home Figure 2 The process for purchasing a mobile from a Minh Hieu’s store From this figure, we can see this process has many steps with manual activities and the customer have to spend more time for manual process. IV. Description of the existing IT/IS to support the process To support for the business process, the current IT/IS includes: At the company level: * A system of computers network, which is operating under the clients/server model. * A accounting software (Fast Accounting) for accounting department. At the showroom level:

Each showroom has 3 computers which can access internet. One computer is installed Fast accounting software for recording Sale and accounting transaction of the showroom but this computer is operating stand – alone not link to the server in the head office. V. Analysis of strengths and weakness of the process Weakness: In side each showroom: * Most of the sale process is done manually and the sale man cannot know the quantity in stock until they check the warehouse because they have no warehouse control system to provide real time information. The customer is not supported and severed properly. * Sale information is not updated real-time to head office. Between showrooms –showroom – head office * The information exchange capacity is very weak, the stock information, sale information is not update in time. * Each showroom is operating separately and rarely supports other showrooms. VI. Recommendation 5. 1 Objective: A comprehensive software and system for Sale – Warehouse management which can: * One system operates on clients/server model allowing computers of 3 showroom to access and work. One system integrates functions for Sale – Warehouse – Accounting. * Support and automatic sale process (invoicing, billing , …) * The sale staff can get information of the available product real-time to serve customer. * Can access and manage the system anywhere through internet. * Easy to use * High security. * Reasonable investment cost. Basing on the above the expected features of the new system, we redesign the purchasing process a mobile as below: Take request Search on system Avaiable?? Delivery, billing and change the phone’s status on system

Search on other store Get from other store Purchase and setup the phone Take phone home Customer Clerk Customer Go to other store Figure 3 : Redesigned purchasing process a mobile from Minh Hieu’s store. 5. 2 Figure 4 : New system Brief description of the new IT-IS system: The new system operates as the client/server model in which, the server is located in the head office and stores the database. The clients are the computers at 3 showrooms and head office. These computers will be installed the software to access to sever and work at the same time.

Moreover, the system also runs the Web function that allow access system from Web to get the information at anywhere internet available. Main function: * Ware house management Module * Module Purchasing management * Module Sale management * Module Payable and receivable management * Module Store and branch management. * Module Customer relationship The estimated cost for investment the new system is about 8000 USD VII. Implementation Plan Step| Detail work| Who| Time | Expected result| Analysis and select the IT provider. The company assigns a team to research and selects the best appropriate IT company. | The team includes Sale manager, Accounting manager, Director. | 1 week| A good IT company is selected and contracted. | System analysis| The consultant analyzes the current system to identify the problem| IT consultant and the team. | 1 week| All problems of current system are identified and discussed in a report | System design| The IT consultant will design a new system to solve the problem| IT consultant and the team| 2 weeks| Proposal for new system. Programming and testing| After proposal is accepted, the IT company will program and write the software, then test the features of the software| IT consultant| 1 months| The software and system meet the requirement and pass the test| Conversion and training | Convert data from current system to new system, training for staffs| IT consultant and the team| 1 week| Data is successful converted to new system, all staffs can use the new system | Inspection and handover| Final check and finish the contract| It consultant and team| 1 days| | Production and Maintenance| Maintain the system, back up data.. support| The team, It consultant, staffs| | The system operates smoothly and meets the requirement. | VIII. Conclusion: Improving competitiveness is very important requirement of the enterprise. With appropriate investment for information technology and effective using of technology systems will help to significantly improve the competitiveness of enterprises.

It is widely known that the information technology helps to improve efficiency, quality of work, reduce costs and better customer service. With the investment in the new system, Minh Hieu expects to increase 30% of sales in 2013. In addition to the above benefits, Minh Hieu expects to improve the standard workflow when applying this new information technology system. IX. List of reference: * http://www. minhhieumobile. com. vn/ * Mr. Toan – Sale Manager . Tel : 043. 5637237 .

1. Why was Dakota’s existing pricing system inadequate for its current operating environment? Profit margins varied based upon the size of the order, larger orders were more profitable than small orders. Based upon customer order size, prices should have been varied and the cost determination of the DOP should have been evaluated as it generated a loss.

2. Develop an ABC system for Dakota based on the Year 2000 data. Calculate the activity cost-diver rate for each activity in 2000.

• a. Order Entry i. Order Entry Expenses/Order Lines ii. 800,000/150,000= $5. 3/line
• b. Carton Processing i. (90% of warehouse personnel expense + Cost of Items)/cartons ii. (9*2,400,000+35,000,000)/80,000= $464. 5/carton
• c. DOP i. (10% of warehouse personnel expense + delivery truck expense)/ DOPs ii. (1*2,400,000+200,000)/2,000= $220/carton d. Handling
• i. (warehouse expenses + freight)/ orders ii. (2,000,000+450,000)/24,000= $102. 08/order

3. Using your answer to #2, calculate the profitability for Customers A and B.

• Order Entry $ 5. 30 60 $ 318. 0 180 $ 954. 00
• Carton Process $ 464. 50 200 $ 92,900. 00 200 $ 92,900. 00
• DOP $ 220. 00 0 $ – 25 $ 5,500. 00
• Handling $ 102. 80 12 $ 1,233. 60 100 $ 10,280. 00
• Revenue $ 103,000. 00 $ 104,000. 00
• Total Cost $ 94,451. 60 $ 109,634. 00
• Net Profit $ 8,548. 40 $ (5,634. 00)
• Profitability %8. 30%-5. 42%

4. What explains any difference in profitability between the two customers? The key difference between the profitability of the two customers is the method of delivery, number, and size of each order.

5. What are the limitations, if any, to the estimates of the profitability of the two customers? Limitations to the estimates of profitability for these two customers are mainly focused on the lack of information. There may be other tangible or intangible pieces of information that may play a significant role in these estimates.

6. Is there any additional information you would like to have to explain the relative profitability of the two customers? Additional information that would be useful around this estimate would include: -Delivery per labor hour -Wages or number of personnel -Number of resources (labor) in each activity

7. Assume that Dakota applies the analysis done in #3 to its entire customer base. How could such information help Dakota managers increase company profits? Dakota managers should revise the desktop delivery pricing to be higher to prevent loss. Customer pricing should be revised based on the number and size of each order. Suppose that a major customer switched from placing all its orders manually to placing all its orders over the Internet site. How should this affect the activity cost driver rates calculated in #2? How would the switch affect Dakota’s profitability? This action would affect two areas, order entry and process cartons. The cost per order would decrease as less labor is need for both processing and entry which would result in increased profitability as two out f the four activities would be reduced.