MCL361 Manufacturing System Design: Term Paper

Due date: 11.59 PM, May 15, 2021

In the term paper, you have to perform a case study where you first have to choose a business
operation involving some inventory management component. For your chosen scenario, describe the
present shortcomings of the operations and tell how the business entity could save money by
improving its operations; or you could describe what shortcomings the business entity was facing and
how it was able to boost its profit margins. It is very important for your term paper to primarily focus
on technology solutions instead of business and financial solutions. There are many such good case
studies available on the internet, for example, refer to this link as a good starting point:
https://www.cathlabdigest.com/articles/Managing-High-Volume-Inventory-Increasing-Efficiency-
Decreasing-Costs-Florida-Hospital

You must write the case study “in your own words” because plagiarism shall be heavily penalized.
You must cite the source material as well as other references that you use. Include diagrams and plots
to boost the reader's understanding. Your term paper shall be evaluated for

(i) how much technically you describe the problems being faced by the business [4 marks]

(ii) how methodical is your analysis before making suggestions [6 marks]

Your term paper should be at least 4 pages and done individually. Use Times New Roman of size 11
with normal margin spaces as given in Microsoft Word. If using overleaf, then use the One-column
IEEE journal article template: https://www.overleaf.com/latex/templates/one-column-ieee-journal-
article/ykctxqgxptrs. Unless you are showing significant maths, using Word is advisable.

Those who perform an Indian case study shall be awarded +1 bonus mark regardless of any factor.
Even if you read up a foreign case study and then perform similar analysis for an Indian business,
then it will be counted as an Indian case study. Those who perform a case study in the healthcare
domain shall get +0.5 bonus mark.

If your term paper contains mathematical analysis, then +1 bonus mark shall be awarded. Including
random mathematical equations shall not be counted as mathematical analysis. Mathematical analysis
comprises detailed mathematical modeling followed by rigorous derivation of a useful formula. If
your term paper contains plots generated via your codes, then +0.5 bonus mark shall be awarded.

Note: The maximum marks you can obtain for the term paper is 10% including the bonuses.