interpretation of 2 case studies (business operations)

Assignment Task You are required to analyse two case studies. Chose 2 case studies from the 4 case studies below.

For each of the two case studies chosen write an ‘interpretation’ in which you comment on the case study using the business operations and systems management topics covered in the module. (400 words max for each, total of 800 words together)

Marking Criteria There are three components to the marking:

Understanding of the case study and understanding of Business Operations and Systems Management topic(s) - 60%

● Level of understanding of the case study ● The selection of appropriate topic(s) with which to interpret the case study ● The correct understanding of the topic(s) and correct application to the case study

How well the ‘interpretation’ is written - 30%

● The degree to which the information from the case study is blended with the concept(s), model(s), etc. from the topic(s)

Presentation and length of ‘interpretation’ 10%

● Spelling, grammar, punctuation etc, ● Compliance with the word count. Marks will be deducted for exceeding 400 words,

or for being significantly short (below 360 words)

Table 1: List of topics in the module

Transformation model and performance objectives Product and service innovation Process design Lean Operations strategy Quality Supply chain Sustainability Inventory Systems in operations Capacity Project management Resource planning and control Operations improvement

Review the module textbook, lectures and seminars to help you identify the concepts, models, etc., that you could include in your interpretation. If there are several you can link to the case study, rank them in terms of relevance and importance to the case. There may be too many to mention in 400 words.

Create an outline for your interpretation. List the points you want and put them in order. Ensure that you are making links between business operations and content of the case study. You do not want to write a document that just describes one or more topic, or just restates the case study. A good interpretation will use academic concepts and models to illuminate and explain the case study.

Produce a full length draft. Ask someone to review your draft. You are free to comment on the work of others but you must not copy another student’s work. After a break of a few days re-read your case study and make improvements.

Guidance on the content of an ‘interpretation’ Characteristics of a good ‘interpretation’:

● Clear links are made between the content in the case study and the concepts, models, etc., from the topics in the module

● The interpretation has an appropriate amount of topic content. It doesn’t try to cram in too many concepts, models, etc., nor does it have too few

Possible characteristics of a weak ‘interpretation’:

● The text describes concepts, models etc. but does not link them to the case study ● The text repeats the information in the case study without interpreting it

using concepts, models, etc., from the topics

Citation and Referencing To keep the assignment simple, you do not need to cite the textbook or other information sources.

Here are the case studies: Case F3 Studio behind Star Wars and James Bond films considers new London site The film studio behind the James Bond and Star Wars franchises has expressed interest in building a new site in east London, as the British film industry struggles to accommodate demand for TV and blockbuster shoots. Pinewood, a cornerstone of the UK’s film and TV production sector, is looking at a 20-acre site in Dagenham after the London mayor, Sadiq Khan, announced plans for a studio in the east of the capital. The “Made in Dagenham” move comes amid growing evidence of a space squeeze in the film industry, with at least two recent big-budget releases – last year’s Alien and Blade Runner sequels – moving production to other countries because there was no room in the UK. Pinewood can film two blockbusters at a time at its studio on the outskirts of west London and one at a nearby sister site in Shepperton. It is midway through a £200m expansion to double its size to keep pace with demand. The UK’s popularity as a filming base is growing so fast – the amount spent on film and TV production rose 11% last year to a record £2.8bn – that Pinewood is understood to have inquired about developing and running the new Dagenham studio. Paul Golding, chairman of Pinewood, said the studio was looking ahead to its next growth phase. “We have sufficient expansion ability to meet demand for the next three to five years. But we have already identified future expansion opportunities.” As well as plans for the Pinewood site, which include demolishing disused buildings and creating new facilities, there are proposals to more than quadruple the size of the Shepperton studios from 25 to 125 acres. Dagenham is now potentially being lined up as a third site. The UK’s top-quality studio facilities and production talent, along with lucrative government tax breaks, have fuelled a boom in film-making that is leading to concerns about capacity and skills shortages. Four of the top five earners at the British box office last year – Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Beauty and the Beast, Dunkirk and Paddington 2 – were based in the UK. Growth continues to be driven by the demand on space and skills required to make big Hollywood films, with investment in UK-filmed blockbusters growing 23% to £1.7bn last year. Upcoming major movies made in Britain include Tim Burton’s upcoming Dumbo, Ron Howard’s Solo: A Star Wars Story, Mission Impossible 6, and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them 2. “The issue is more than looming. Space is at a premium in the UK,” said Adrian Wootton, chief executive of the British Film Commission. “The space at the most premium everyone would recognise is for really huge feature films. It is fair to say that we can’t accommodate every major movie at any particular time that wants to come here.” Wootton said that while there isn’t yet a “crisis”, due to studio space in the UK doubling in the last four years, the level of demand means there is a constant challenge to expand quickly. The squeeze on resources has been exacerbated by a booming TV sector, thanks to Netflix, Amazon and Apple. Spending on high-end TV production in the UK, from Game of Thrones to Peaky Blinders and The Crown, rose 9% to a record £938m last year. Almost three-quarters of that, £684m, came from overseas companies. While TV productions do not compete directly with blockbuster films for studio space, they do use the same pool of creative talent, from directors and set designers to make up artists and cameramen. The BFI has estimated that the industry will need up to 10,000 new workers in the film industry across a range of roles in the next five years to keep pace with demand. “I think it could well be higher,” said Golding. “Netflix is spending $8bn this year, Amazon $4.5bn, Apple $1bn. These are huge numbers and you have to provide the crews and space or you will miss out.”

2) Case G10 Jonathan Franzen's book Freedom suffers UK recall More than 8,000 copies of the American author's latest opus have been recalled due to hundreds of typesetting errors

The American author Jonathan Franzen might justly be called a perfectionist: his latest opus, Freedom, took nine years of painstaking effort to complete inside a spartan writing studio – and is now being widely acclaimed as a modern masterpiece.

So it is particularly unfortunate that, thanks to an apparent mistake by his typesetters, the version published in Britain has been found to be littered with errors.

In a highly embarrassing move, publishers HarperCollins were today forced to offer to exchange thousands of copies after Franzen revealed that the UK edition of a novel dubbed "the book of the century" is based on an early draft manuscript, and contains hundreds of mistakes in spelling, grammar and characterisation.

More than 8,000 copies of the faulty first edition have been sold since it was published last week, with 80,000 hardbacks of the book in print. The mistakes were discovered yesterday.

Franzen told the Guardian that the book, the follow-up to 2001's Pulitzer Prize-nominated The Corrections, contained "a couple of hundred differences at the level of word and sentence and fact" as well as "small but significant changes to the characterisations of Jessica and Lalitha" – the daughter and the assistant of one of the novel's central characters.

HarperCollins, who say the errors are mainly typographical, have launched a hurried operation to let purchasers exchange their faulty copy via bookshops or pre-paid post. The new version is being rushed through the printers over the weekend and will be available early next week.

"My main interest is in getting the word out that 4th Estate is starting a free exchange programme," said Franzen, stressing the error was not the publisher's.

HarperCollins, which runs the 4th Estate imprint, said the crucial mistake happened when a small Scottish typesetter, Palimpsest, sent "the last but one version" of the book file to the printers. Palimpsest was not available for comment.

"It was just a mistake that happened," said Siobhan Kenny, director of communications for HarperCollins UK. "It's too early to say whether action will be taken against the typesetters, but we will still use them. We just want to make sure that all the fans can read the correct version of the books as soon as possible," she said.

"The US version of the book is fine, so is the audiobook and the ebook. These aren't errors that affect the plot, they are typographic errors. But obviously Franzen spent 10 years writing this book and he wants everything to be read exactly as he wrote it. He is most concerned about his real fans and he wants to give them the book as he wants it."

HarperCollins UK has set up a "Freedom recall hotline" for customers who have purchased a copy of the mistake-ridden book. A staff member at the hotline described the situation as "quite frantic".

HarperCollins is not planning a full scale recall of the 80,000 hardback copies in bookshops for logistical reasons. Such a print run would have cost the publisher around £70,000, estimated fellow publisher John Blake, with distribution and other costs ramping the amount up to around £100,000. "My heart bleeds for them on every level," he said.

A spokesman for the Waterstone's chain of bookshops, Jon Howells agreed. "My heart goes out to whoever pressed the wrong button," he said, adding that the bookseller had not, as yet, received any complaints about faulty copies from its customers. "We've not been asked to pull it from the shelves by the publisher, so we won't," he said, predicting that interest in the first edition could rocket following the news about its errors.

"I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people start popping in to pick one up because they want to get the sequel to The Corrections without the corrections," he said. "Maybe it'll make it an interesting collector's item."

3) Case H9 Chinese Copper, Italian Marble: Coronavirus Shipping Delays Hurt Developers When it comes to obtaining building materials, real estate developers often buy globally, not locally. But as the coronavirus spreads across the world, bringing countries to a standstill, the lack of access to overseas supplies is sending jitters through the construction industry.

Delayed so far at large-scale residential and commercial projects have been goods like marble, tile, paving stones, furniture, lighting equipment and elevators — and even models of buildings themselves, workers say.

Warning signs are appearing on multiple fronts. And the setbacks threaten jobs in an industry that employs millions of people. In many cases, no materials means no work, analysts say.

“It’s not like when you build a house and can just go down to a Home Depot and get a different light fixture when you’re short,” said Chris Heger, a vice president of OAC Services, a Seattle firm that manages construction projects. “This stuff is all designed and planned years in advance.”

Theater seats from Colombia, wooden doors from Italy and metal ceilings from Germany bound for a new corporate campus in Silicon Valley are likely to be delayed, which will slow down work, said Mr. Heger, who is overseeing the project. He declined to identify it.

“I’ve been doing this for 30 years,” Mr. Heger said of a period that included the slowdown after the Sept. 11 attacks and the recession of 2008. “And I’ve never seen anything like this.”

Many of the components that make up a building come from China, even after Beijing and Washington got into a messy trade war.

At the Port of Los Angeles, imports from China, including construction materials, were down 23 percent in February from the same period last year, said Mark D. Fergus, a vice president of the consulting firm Cumming Corporation who is based Los Angeles and has managed condo, shopping center and hotel projects.

China is also the center of the coronavirus outbreak, and products scheduled to ship from the country in recent weeks have been plagued by further delays.

Contractors have complained that shipments of Chinese copper have not arrived on time. Hotel furniture from the Philippines, a country that has quarantined much of its population, is also expected to be late, Mr. Fergus said. “And the situation is only going to be exacerbated as we lock down other countries,” he said. “We’re trying to identity the risk and find alternative sources.”

As of Tuesday, just a handful of large private projects, like one involving a hospital expansion that may put patients at risk, have stopped work by their choosing, economists say. One reason for the low number of shutdowns may be that some materials from China had been stockpiled in advance to offset vacations taken in February by Chinese factory workers for Lunar New Year, they say.

“It’s still mostly business as usual,” said Ken Simonson, the chief economist with the Associated General Contractors of America, a Virginia-based trade group. “But the anticipation is that there will major supply-chain problems of a variety of types.”

Even the smallest components are being affected. Controllers for LEDs, which used to take two months to arrive from China, are now be expected to take at least six, he said.

Maintaining quality during production, which often includes producing finishing touches for prominent developments, has also become difficult, Mr. Sciame said.

He was supposed to fly to Manchester, England, this week to inspect a mock-up version of a stage door planned for a new theater that his company is constructing in Manhattan. But the Trump administration banned flights to Britain from the United States.

Videoconferencing may be a substitute in some situations, “but there is nothing like having boots on the ground,” Mr. Sciame said. “The disruption in travel will be impactful.”

In the same vein, the travel bans have affected stoneworkers who regularly travel to quarries in other countries to handpick materials for kitchen counters, like PMI International Stone Importers, a New Jersey-based firm whose product graces department stores, office buildings and condos.

The company’s planned trip in early March to northern Italy to select white marble — one of six such trips a year — was scrapped in the wake of Italy’s national quarantine, said Kevin Gavaghan, a PMI sales manager.

Because PMI will not commit to the expensive stone until it can be seen in person, orders are not likely to be placed until June, Mr. Gavaghan said. “Some projects are going to be stalled because of this,” he said. “There’s no question about it.”

Not everything comes from abroad: Rebar, concrete and lumber often come from American suppliers.

But domestic sources for other materials, like ceramic tiles, may not be so easy to line up overnight, said Joseph Lundgren, a Dallas-based consultant to the tile industry.

Today, 70 percent of the ceramic tiles available in the United States come from elsewhere, Mr. Lundgren said, with Brazil, Turkey and Spain leading the way. The 11 American factories that do make tiles cannot meet the increased demand.

With three months of tile inventory on hand, shortages will probably not result anytime soon, he said. But he wondered if there would be dockworkers to greet tile-carrying ships in the coming months if the U.S. infrastructure shuts down.

Price, of course, dictates where developers shop, and because foreign markets often have lower-cost items, they have become a go-to source.

But with the coronavirus crisis, longtime calculations might have to be rethought, said Jeffrey E. Levine, the chairman of Douglaston Development, a New York-based housing developer.

Paying a bit more for domestic materials whose delivery is less at risk in future crises might be a smarter bet, he said. And the shift in strategy is playing out in real time.

For a 931-unit apartment tower that Douglaston is building in the Hudson Yards neighborhood of Manhattan, for instance, Mr. Levine will probably no longer install Italian cabinets, favoring a New Jersey manufacturer instead.

But in an indication of how difficult a buy-American approach may be, that New Jersey company, as it turns out, gets its raw materials from China. “It’s forcing us to dive into the supply chain,” Mr. Levine said.

4) Case E1 Samsung and Panasonic accused over supply chain labour abuses in Malaysia Samsung and Panasonic, two of the world’s leading electronics brands, are facing allegations that workers in their supply chains are being duped, exploited and underpaid in Malaysia.

The two companies have launched investigations into allegations of abuse made by Nepalese workers after a Guardian investigation raised multiple concerns about their treatment.

The men said they had been deceived about pay, had their passports confiscated and had been told that they must pay large fines if they wanted to return to Nepal before the end of their contract. They also claimed they were forced to work for up to 14 hours on their feet without adequate rest, and with restricted toilet breaks, in an attempt to settle recruitment fees of up to £1,000 – they said they had to pay this money to secure their jobs.

They said they felt “cheated” and trapped in their factory jobs making or assembling components for household electrical goods sold on the global market.

“My heart is aching,” said one young man who works in a factory making Samsung microwaves. “I was not given the job I was promised. I am doing very difficult work. I haven’t got the salary they said I would get.”

The Guardian spoke to 30 Nepalese migrants making products for Samsung and Panasonic. Some of those working for Samsung are employed directly by the company, but the majority are hired through a labour supply company. The workers assembling or making parts for Panasonic are employed by subcontracting companies.

Both Panasonic and Samsung forbid their suppliers from confiscating passports or charging migrant workers recruitment fees. Yet all the men interviewed by the Guardian claimed they paid up to £1,000 to recruitment agents in Nepal to secure their jobs in Malaysia. They all also claimed that their passports were confiscated on arrival in the country, illegal under Malaysian employment law.

Workers said this restricts their freedom of movement and leaves them open to detention by the authorities. Without their passports, the workers said they couldn’t freely leave their jobs and return home without paying fines equivalent to three or four months’ basic salary.

Both Samsung and Panasonic have said they are opening investigations into the conduct of their suppliers following the claims.

The use of labour supply companies and subcontractors is common practice for foreign firms making goods for export in Malaysia but is a system ripe for abuse, according to labour rights groups in the country. Workers making Samsung products said they were threatened by supervisors at their labour supply company when they

said they were unhappy with their work and wanted to return home. “They told us, ‘If you don’t work, or leave without paying, we’ll bury you in Malaysia,’” said one man.

Workers for the labour supply company used by Samsung also claimed they were deceived about the nature and conditions of their work. They said they had been forced to pay illegal fees by recruitment agents used by their labour supply company hours before they departed for their new jobs. Some said the salary they were promised in Nepal was higher than the pay they were now receiving in Malaysia.

“I wouldn’t have come here if I had known the real conditions and salary. I was manipulated,” said one man.

“[The labour supply company in Nepal] are using the name of Samsung to cheat people,” said another worker. “We have been cheated, but we don’t want others to be cheated.”

Other Nepalese workers said they paid between 90,000-115,000 rupees (£685-£875) to a labour recruitment agency in Kathmandu used by Samsung, despite a 2015 cap on recruitment fees set at 10,000 rupees (£75) by the Nepalese government in 2015.

“I paid 115,000 rupees, but the agent only gave me a receipt for 10,000 rupees. He told me that if I was stopped at the airport I should say that that is all I paid,” said one man working at Samsung’s microwave plant. “I knew the agent was cheating me, but what could I do?”

A spokesperson from Samsung said: “As a committed member of the Electronics Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC), we comply fully with the EICC’s Code of Conduct and have found no evidence of violations in the hiring process of migrant workers hired directly by our manufacturing facility in Malaysia. Once there is any complaint, we take swift actions to investigate.

“We are currently conducting on-site investigations of labour supply companies we work with in Malaysia and the migrant employees hired by these companies. If any violations are uncovered, we will make immediate corrective actions and moving forward we will suspend our business with companies that are found to be in violation.”

In a factory in the capital, exhausted workers making parts for Panasonic spoke of having to work week after week of 14-hour shifts to try to repay the money they gave to recruitment agents in Nepal. Some said they were still far off paying their debts 15 months after arriving in Malaysia. Others claimed they had been told by their companies they must pay the equivalent of three months’ wages if they left before the end of their contract.

“If I could find a way to go back, I’d leave right now but I am trapped by my debts,” said one Nepalese worker, who makes parts for Panasonic. “95% of workers here would do the same.”

Workers assembling Panasonic products in the southern city of Johor Bahru said that they sometimes only received 700 ringgit (£133) a month – half of what they were promised – after production slowed due to a lack of orders.

“We know our earnings are below minimum wage, but what can we do about it?” said one of the workers. “We feel terrible because we have a big loan to pay back. You have to work for three years just to pay it off.”

Life beyond the assembly line is difficult too. In accommodation visited by the Guardian, workers were living in a grim hostel in an industrial area in Johor with 14 men crammed into one mouldy room. They all shared one broken toilet and two shower cubicles, which opened directly on to a cooking area with a single gas cooker.

In an emailed statement, Panasonic said, “Panasonic will conduct a full investigation into the claims made by the Guardian. We are taking these allegations very seriously and if, in fact, we discover that one of our suppliers has violated such laws or regulations, we will ensure and require them to take necessary corrective action immediately.

“We expect all of our suppliers to strictly comply with our CSR [Corporate Social Responsibility] policy and declaration. These expectations are outlined in Panasonic’s contracted terms and conditions with each supplier. We do not tolerate breaches of these terms.”

The workers interviewed by the Guardian also complained about conditions inside the factories.

“The work is extremely difficult,” said one worker at a Samsung electronics plant making microwave ovens. “You get only 45 minutes in a 12-hour shift to eat, and seven minutes every two hours to drink water.”

Other workers making parts and assembling products for Panasonic said that they stood all day without decent breaks. One worker claimed they were only allowed to stop work to go to the toilet twice in a 12-hour shift.

The electronics sector in Malaysia, which accounts for nearly 35% of the country’s export economy, has faced international scrutiny for its treatment of migrant workers. In 2014 a report by supply chain watchdog Verité found that nearly one third of workers in Malaysia’s electronics sector are in forced labour, and called for wide reforms of the policies of foreign companies operating there.

“Brands working in Malaysia have to recognise that the standard operating procedure for labour contractors is debt bondage and this has ramifications,” said Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch in Asia.

“Taking someone from Nepal and putting them in a factory in Malaysia costs money, and if these costs are not being factored into the price of a phone, or a microwave or a speaker, then they are complicit in a system that expects the workers to suffer as a result.”