The Labeling of The Word “Year”

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: This IS a group assignment. You are on your honor. You cannot discuss any aspect of this case or anything related to it with any other teams. You cannot use any other outside resources other than your notes, course articles and material, and your own team members. The case can be purchased online. This case is the same case we used for MAS 1 Western Optimization.

Assignment Information

During this presentation and simulation you can change any item your team deems necessary to obtain the optimal supply chain performance within the limits of the case. The only items you CANNOT change are the time fence and the plant warehouse! See the questions below to help direct your focus for the presentation.

Please Note–A Small Notation Problem–The Labeling of The Word “Year”: As you have noticed when you run the simulation, it labels the time line and uses the word “Year” as Year 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5! Unfortunately —in some of the introductory information, podcasts, readings, etc. many times we refer to the initial year as Year 0! As mentioned, the simulation starts with Year 1–So Year 1 from the simulation and Year 0 from the other information are the same! Please make the appropriate adjustments depending upon how you label your documents. In any case, you should not have more than five total years—either Year 0 through Year 4 or Year 1 through Year 5! You can see in either situation they have a total of five years.
Assignment Deliverables
1. 15 to 18-slide professional PowerPoint presentation
2. A copy of the print out for each of the five year’s optimized case runs. Please submit the entire run using either a Word document or PDF file in a portrait mode! (If you have not changed your optimized case from the previous assignment, then you do not need to resubmit Year 0, which the run calls Year 1.
3. A copy of your project plan, including a Critical Path document
4. A copy of the actual Excel spreadsheet that shows the NPV calculations– it must fit on one sheet in a landscape mode
The Assignment Questions: Part 1: New Markets
Please answer the following questions in your presentation:
1. What is your recommended network design for MAS in Year 5, and what supply chain and financial performance can be expected from this network? Turn in a printout showing the simulation results of all five years. You have already completed the first year (some call it Year 0) from the previous work on the optimized MAS 1 supply chain.
2. How should MAS make the transition from your base Year 1 recommendations of the first assignment to your strategic Year 5 structure? You must have a plan (part of the critical path) and printout for each of the intervening years.
3. Complete the Net Present Value calculation for the five-year period based upon the information presented in the specific case guidelines. See helpful hints below to give guidance on the NPV!
4. What is the critical path? Part of the plan listed above in #2!
5. What are the risks/tradeoffs associated with your recommendation. As part of this item consider the critical path risks?
6. Draw a process control map (schematic) of the “To Be” supply chain in Year 5, and include all of the information that is available and would be useful for a supply chain professional manager. Please note, this diagram will be almost a value stream map–we will be lacking a bit of information for that to occur!
7. If MAS’s forecasts of future demand increases (over and above the base demand exhibited in the initial year) turn out to be overestimated by 50 percent, what will be the risks to MAS? If this error has a 30 percent chance of occurring in the years leading up to and including the last year (Year 5), would you alter your recommendations in any way? Explain. (Hint—by using your understanding of the difference between fixed and variable costs, you can calculate the new profit contribution provided by a given network for any lower, or higher, level of sales.)
The Assignment Questions: MAS Eastern Expansion Part 2: The Project
The following deliverables are required for the MAS Eastern Expansion, Part 2: The Project Assignment:
1. NPV calculation
2. Each group will collaborate on the preparation of a PowerPoint presentation–Part 2–summarizing your analysis of the case questions
3. Critical Path Method document–this item should be kept to about 15 to 20 activities
4. Crashing impacts
Assignment Formatting:
• Please attach the cover page listed below.
• All Excel Spreadsheets must fit on one page and be in a landscape mode.
• One Excel Spreadsheet should show the NPV cash flow calculations for Option: East of the Mississippi from Year 1 through Year 5 (Some folks call Year 0 our Year 1)!
• Points will be deducted for not following formatting directions.
Helpful Hints: The Eastern MAS Expansion Case Part 1 and Part 2:
• Discount rate 15%
• Year 1 is the base year–sometimes it is referred to as the 0 Year
• For the initial year you will use your Optimized Solution from the First MAS Case submitted on or near March 1st, when you optimized just the Western States–that is your new base case–not the very original one that comes up at the beginning of a simulation run. The new base case is your team’s optimized case!
• You need to run a simulation for each year after that year and hand in the entire run–you have already run one for Year 1—so no need to hand it in a second time unless you have changed it!
• Tax rate is 34%
• NPV based on Year 1 through and including Year 5
• No depreciation or working capital to consider
• No administrative, marketing or general SG& A to consider
• The larger the NPV, the better

Option #2 East of the Mississippi:
Supply Chain Income Statement Impacts
• Sales—Utilize your team’s Year 1 (0) optimized solution from March 1st for starting point in Year 1 (0). The sales for each year thereafter from the Supply Chain Income Statement for each year!
• COGS— Utilize the “Supply Chain Financial Statements “ page of your team’s Year 1 (0) optimized solution for variable costs as the Year 1 (0) starting point for this exercise–variable costs are the COGS–and the COGS for each year thereafter from the appropriate year Supply Chain Income Statement
• Fixed Costs— See “Supply Chain Financial Statements “ page of your team’s Year 1 (0) optimized solution for fixed costs as the Year 1 (0) starting point for this exercise and the fixed costs for each year thereafter from the appropriate year Supply Chain Income Statement
• Inventory— See “Supply Chain Financial Statements “ page of your team’s Year 1 (0) optimized solution for income statement inventory costs as the Year 1 (0) starting point for this exercise and the fixed costs for each year thereafter from the appropriate year Supply Chain Income Statement
Supply Chain Assets Employed Investment Impacts
• Other Annual Capital Outlays—None
• Plants—Utilize optimized simulation for Year 1 (0)—for years Year 1 (0) through Year 5 use the incremental costs between each year! See “Supply Chain Financial Statements “page under the heading “Supply Chain Assets Employed” for the appropriate year
• Plant Warehouses—See optimized simulation for Year 1 (0)— for years Year 1 (0) through Year 5 use the incremental costs between each year! See “Supply Chain Financial Statements “page under the heading “Supply Chain Assets Employed” for the appropriate year
• DC’s—See optimized simulation for Year 1 (0)— for years Year 1 (0) through Year 5 use the incremental costs between each year! See “Supply Chain Financial Statements “page under the heading “Supply Chain Assets Employed” for the appropriate year
• Inventory—See optimized simulation for Year 1 (0)— for years Year 1 (0) through Year 5 use the incremental costs between each year! See “Supply Chain Financial Statements “page under the heading “Supply Chain Assets Employed” for the appropriate year

Grading Guidelines: (The instructor reserves the right to change the grading criteria.)
Grading Criteria Points
Project Definition _____ Out of 10
Schematic _____ Out of 10
CPM plus Milestones _____ Out of 20
Crashing _____ Out of 20
Supply Chain Optimization _____ Out of 20
Net Present Value _____ Out of 20
Presentation Analysis and Quality _____ Out of 100
Total Assignment Points _____ Out of 200

Grading Sheet for Eastern MAS PowerPoint Presentation

Writing assignments stress organizing thoughts in the appropriate hierarchy and sequence, selecting words for their power and expressiveness, using technical terms in appropriate contexts, and representing complex data and symbols precisely in prose.

Writing assignments require the use of appropriate business language–do not use slang, unprofessional language, colloquialisms, etc.
Recommended Action:
1. Are the criteria for selected recommendations stated?
2. Is the plan integrated in a logical manner and linked to the analysis?
3. Is the action plan specific and complete?

Analysis:
1. Does the presentation contain analysis of the major issues?
2. Does the analysis incorporate concepts/techniques from the readings?
3. Does the analysis effectively incorporate information from the case?
4. Does the analysis show relationships among important factors?
5. Are assumptions explicitly stated?
6. Does the analysis isolate fundamental causes of the problems?
7. Does the analysis contain enough detail to support recommendations, causes and effects, etc.?
8. When the analysis is undertaken does it use the information at its disposal correctly, thereby leading to correct answers?
9. Did the slides correctly incorporate sensitivity analysis and were the appropriate items sensitized?