Applied Business Optimization and Modelling

Order Description

Requirements for Assessment
–    The assessment comes from Applied Business Optimization and Modelling
–    Text book used is Winston, W., and Albright, S. (2016). Practical Management Science, 5th ed, South-Western/Cengage.
–    Some of required readings Bowersox, D. J. (2013). Chapter 12: Network Design, in Supply Chain Logistics Management, 4th ed., New York, ISBN: 9780078024054
–    Chopra, S. and Meindl, P. (2013). Chapter 17: Information technology in a supply chain, in Supply Chain Management – Strategy, Planning and Operation, 5th ed, Essex, ISBN: 9780273765226
–    Coyle J. J., Langley C. J., Novack R. A., and Gibson B. J (2013). Chapter 12: Supply Chain Network Analysis and Design, in Supply Chain management a Logistics Perspective, Mason, South-Western, Cengage Learning
–    Some of required readings and lecture note and exercise examples will be uploaded
–    The questions and case are in another file uploaded
–    The problems are must be solved through optimization model through Excel Solver
–    The method how you solve the problem must be provided
–    The Excel file should be uploaded to check the model is right or wrong (This is very critical point)
–    If you get wrong model, you will need to start writing from first step again. So, please give me a Excel file you have solved as soon as you build model and solve problem to check the answer is wrong or right
–    Words limitation is 1500 word and Safeassign matching rate should be under 5%
–    10 References are required which is open access
–    Focus on problem solving and answering questions

Disclaimer
Please note all the information and any related data presented in this project are NOT accurate, and are not supported by any reference either. They are only provided for you for this project. You should not assume that this is real data.
Background
In this project, we will be working on a supply network design problem for a company— let’s call the company ‘SND Australia Limited’ and use ‘SND’ for short. SND operates across Australia in the following major cities: Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney.
SND has an overseas supplier—let’s call it ‘OVS’—which has been steadily supplying SND’s demand over the years. OVS uses sea transport to supply SND and transports all the goods to the designated ports as speci?ed by SND. As all the major cities have ports, we assume that once freight reaches a port, there will be no additional cost required to get into the corresponding city. There will be additional costs, however, if SND decides to re-direct freight from one city to another city within Australia. When such a decision is made, the re-direction of freight will be managed via road transport and the corresponding road freight charges apply.
A?ected by recent uncertainty and volatility in business environment, the top management of SND has allocated a budget for setting up a subsidiary in Australia—let’s call it ‘DMS’— to complement any quick surge in demand. The subsidiary DMS, when requested, will be able to produce a maximum of 500 units per month for SND. At other times, DMS seeks opportunities from other business and therefore does not incur cost to SND. In this project, please assume that the set up cost of DMS will be the same for any city in Australia. In this sense, this set up (?xed) cost does not need to be considered.
SND adopts and operates on a monthly ordering cycle and therefore we will only focus on one month’s logistics activities to design the supply network. The objective is to design a supply network that minimises the total logistics cost. Table 1 lists the demand for each major city and the unit production cost if DMS chooses to operate at the particular city.

Demand at    Units    Produce at    Unit cost
Adelaide    420    DMS Adelaide    $450
Brisbane    870    DMS Brisbane    $480
Melbourne    1,250    DMS Melbourne    $505
Perth    930    DMS Perth    $490
Sydney    1,310    DMS Sydney    $515
DMS OVS    $440
Table 1: Demand and unit production cost for SND.
Transport Cost and Lead Time
Sea transport will be used for the shipments from the overseas supplier OVS; while road transport will be used for transport within Australia. For sea transport, we will be able to use either 20’ or 40’ containers. In addition, less-than-container load (LCL) could also be used, i.e., sea transport on a unit basis and charged by the number of units shipped. Each 40’ container can hold 200 units; and each 20’ container can hold half of that amount, i.e., 100 units. Due to loading and safety constraints, containers must be fully loaded at all times. If the number of units is not enough to ?ll a full container, then the LCL option—where special safety measures are taken—must be used.
$/40’ container    $/20’ container    $/LCL unit    Lead times (Days)
Adelaide    2,000    1,200    25    30
Brisbane    1,600    1,000    20    21
Melbourne    1,800    1,100    23    28
Perth    1,200    700    15    18
Sydney    1,650    1,050    22    25
Table 2: Sea transport cost and lead time from overseas supplier to cities
SND needs to pay its supplier upfront, which means that SND needs to bear the inventory holding cost when the freight is being transported from OVS. Table 2 presents the unit transport prices for a 40’ container, a 20’ container, and a unit transported via LCL. The lead time of sea transport between OVS and each major city is also listed in the table. The accounting department mentions that an annual interest rate of 15% would be reasonable to calculate the inventory holding cost.
Within Australia, road transport will be used. The unit transport cost between each pair of cities is shown in Table 3.Becausee?cientroadtransportonlytakes1–3daysbetween any pair of cities, the holding cost can be safely ignored

Adelaide    Brisbane    Melbourne    Perth    Sydney
Adelaide    $0    $35    $10    $35    $25
Brisbane    $35    $0    $25    $70    $15
Melbourne    $10    $25    $0    $45    $15
Perth    $35    $70    $45    $0    $55
Sydney    $25    $15    $15    $55    $0
Table 3: Road transport cost per unit between cities
Project Tasks
The tasks for the project are straightforward, as a group, you need to determine:
1. What is the lowest cost for SND? (Remember to include all the related cost components in your model.) And where should SND set up its subsidiary DMS?
2. How is the international sea transport and the domestic road transport managed?
3. What can you conclude from you model
4. How sensitive is your solution to some of the parameters, such as unit cost at di?erent places, transport cost, lead time?
5. How sensitive is your solution to the ?uctuations of demand?
6. What will happen if SND does not set up the subsidiary DMS? More speci?cally, how would the transport operations change?