School of Technology Management & Logistics

College of Business
Universiti Utara Malaysia
BJTM3043: Perancangan dan Kawalan Pembuatan
Project 2

Project overview
The manufacturing planning and control (MPC) system is concerned with
planning and controlling all aspects of manufacturing, including managing
materials, scheduling machines and people, and coordinating suppliers and key
customers. There are a wide range of MPC designs that depend on a companys
business strategy for competing in the marketing place. In this project, you need
to investigate a manufacturing company and identify its MPC system.

Tasks
1. Company visit and interview
2. Report writing

Project details
Task 1: Company visit and interview
A. Initial contact with company
Determine appropriate manufacturing company to visit
Make initial contact with the company
Explain in general terms the purpose of the visit
Agree the principal contact within the company for making arrangements

B. Suggested questions
Topic
Industry level
context

Company level
context

Materials,
production
processes, and
technology

Manufacturing
planning and
control

Questions
History how has the industry developed; what technical
and structural changes have occurred?
Markets where are the major markets how is his
forecast to change; what are the current market
conditions; what are the major trends affecting the
industry.
Competition who are the major players; what market
shares.
History what is the history of the company; has the
ownership structure changed.
Scale key metrics for this company turnover,
employees, products.
Structure how is the company structured?
Market where does the company position itself in the
market; who is the competition; who are the customers;
where they are.
Products what is the range of products?
Strategy what is the business models how does the
company make money; how does the company compete
price, quality delivery, responsiveness, etc.
Materials what range of material is used why; where
are they sourced.
Production processes what production processes are
employed; are there any areas expertise; what level of
automation is in evidence is the operation labour
intensive or capital intensive.
Technology how does the company stay abreast of
technical developments?
How many product variants are there?
What are the key challenges in matching supply and
demand?
What is the typical time from order to delivery?
What cost reduction techniques are used?
What are the systems (include type of software) for
controlling production flow MRP, ERP, JIT, Kanban, etc.

Task 2: Report writing

A. Report structure
Title page authors name, course and the date.
Acknowledgement acknowledge any help you have received in collecting
the information for the report.
Table of content list all the main sections of the report in sequence with
the page numbers; list of figures; list of tables.
Introduction context and scope of the report.

Content 1 - Industry level context

Content 2 - Company level context
Content 3 - Materials, production processes, and technology
Content 4 - Manufacturing planning and control
Conclusion draw together the main issues. It should be expressed clearly
and should not present any new information.
B. Suggestion for conclusion
Manufacturing strategy
Market
characteristic
s

Manufacturing
Task

Features

Manufacturing planning and control

system
Master
production
scheduling

Detailed
material
planning

Shop-floor
system

C. Marking criteria
Report organisation
Content
Mechanics grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, spelling
Aesthetics formatting and appearance
References
Timeliness report handed in on time

Course assessment and dateline (20% of overall course carry marks)

1
.

Report

Marking
scheme
100%

Tentative
dateline
3 June 2015