Modern Production Concepts

Modern production concepts can be considered as an essential field of economics nowadays. They help to give valuable insights and thus provide important competitive advantages. There is a broad variety of new approaches to Production Planning and Control (PPC), Just-in-Time (JIT), Flexible Manufacturing Systems (FMS), Flexible Automation (FA), Automated Guided Vehicle Systems (AGVS), Total Quality Control (TQC), and Computer Integrated Manufacturing (CIM), all of which are indispensable cornerstones in this context. This book presents in a condensed and easy-to-comprehend form the different contributions of a group of internationally recommended scientists. The varied approaches to modern production concepts are not only based on theoretical foundations but also go one step further in that they present the implementation of these concepts and methods in detail. This close link with practical aspects will help to illuminate the theoretical material for researchers and students in universities. The book will be of major importance for practitioners involved in solving everyday industrial problems. The interdisciplinary nature of these contributions will help to create a new and valuable perspective on the field of production concepts.

In "Modern Hamlets and Their Soliloquies" (Iowa, 1992), Mary Maher examined how modern actors have chosen to perform HamletOCOs soliloquies, and why they made the choices they made, within the context of their specific productions of the play. Adding to original interviews with, among others, Derek Jacobi, David Warner, Kevin Kline, and Ben Kingsley, "Modern Hamlets and Their Soliloquies: An Expanded Edition" offers two new and insightful interviews, one with Kenneth Branagh, focusing on his 1997 film production of the play, and one with Simon Russell Beale, discussing his 2000-2001 run as Hamlet at the Royal National Theatre."

Production theory and the theory of cost both belong to the central areas of business administration, for all considerations concerning the economic organization of industrial manufacturing processes start from these. Two developments in the past 30 years have had a considerable influence on the structure and the concentration on points of emphasis in this book. I am referring to findings from KOOPMANS' activity analysis and to the formulation by GUTENBERG of a production function concept that focuses on industrial production processes. Activity analysis has made it possible to develop, from a uniform approach, different types of production functions which describe the concrete principles of production in the productive sector of a business enterprise; this has created a common basis for all production concepts in business administration. The Gutenberg Production Function with its different kinds of adjustment to a changing output has opened up a flexibility to theoretical and practical considerations that gave rise to a large number of additional studies in this area. Considerations in cost theory were in particular need of considerable extensions in the direction of cost minimal combined adjustment processes. By means of the organization of its contents, this book will take both approaches into due account. In that way, it is vastly different from other books dealing with the same subject. As a matter of course, traditional analytical methods and ways of thinking also constitute a large part of the book.

The book focuses on the context of social and political keitsdiskussion sustainability and the growing difficulties in road freight with the question of how rail services can be practically integrated into the value network of industrial and commercial enterprises. The integration of the material and information flows to the large number of legally independent actors is the focus.​

Computer Integrated Manufacturing (CIM) is the computerized handling of integrated operational processes between production planning and control, design, process planning, production, and quality assurance. The consistent application of information technology, along with modern manufacturing techniques and new organizational procedures, opens up great potential for rationalization by speeding up processes, thereby reducing stocks and improving product structure and delivery times. Following a comprehensive justification of the CIM integration principle, this book discusses the current state of applications and new demands arising from the integration principle as applied to the individual CIM components. The interfaces between business and technical information processing are considered in detail. The main emphasis, however, is on strategies for realization and implementation based on concrete experi- ence. The "Y-CIM information management" model, developed and tested at the author's institute, is presented as a procedural method for implementing CIM and demonstrated using up-to-date examples. In addition to the procedure for developing a CIM strategy, concrete sub-projects are developed which are directed at specific sector or enterprise structures. The survey of further CIM developments including design stage cost estimation, use of expert systems and inter-company process chains have proved to be effective CIM components since the first edition of this book and are now treated in the main text. Six German and five American industrial implementations are presented to illustrate the diverse areas of emphasis in the implementation sequence, and to indicate how CIM can be realized with currently available data processing tools.

How industrial companies in Germany's critically important investment goods sector are deploying new technological and organizational production concepts to adapt to competitiveness challenges, new market requirements, environmental demands, and policy pressures is examined in this book. It draws on the Fraunhofer ISI's unique nationwide survey of technology use and production in Germany. East German as well as West German data is analyzed. Readers will gain fresh insights about the diffusion of new production concepts, the interaction of process and product innovations, and subsequent effects on productivity, employment, work flexibility, and the business performance of German industry. Implications for business strategy, public policy, and ongoing research into technology diffusion are considered.