Abstract
This article reports on a preliminary evaluation of the performance of UKTLCS's inventory and forecasting system. This is undertaken while making recommendations for new techniques for intermittent item demand. A total of 92 items are identified as largely intermittent. These items are identified by examining both cost drivers and the most expensive spare part consumables. Research into the current proprietary system identified an imprecision problem with the current forecasting approach. For example, it is shown that imprecision of the forecasting approach may have meant that the demands for a number of cost drivers are being substantially miscalculated. For propriety reasons, all data have been sanitised.
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Notes on contributors
Matthew Downing
Matthew Downing is now a Strategic Forecasting and Inventory Modelling Specialist with Boeing's UK Through Life Customer Support Programme. He holds an MSc in Operations Research from the University of Southampton. In 2010, his MSc dissertation won the Silver (runner up) prize for the Operations Research Society May Hicks award for the best Master's Student project.
Max Chipulu
Max Chipulu is a Lecturer in Management Science at the University of Southampton. He has previous working experience in banking. His main interest is in Data Analysis and Application of Multivariate Statistical Modelling. Chipulu obtained his PhD in Management Science and Statistics from the University of Southampton in 2003.
Udechukwu Ojiako
Udechukwu (Udi) Ojiako is a Lecturer in Project Management at the University of Southampton. Before joining the University of Southampton, he was a Senior Lecturer in Project Management at the University of Northumbria, Newcastle upon Tyne (October 2006 – March 2009). Ojiako obtained his PhD in Project Management from the University of Northumbria, Newcastle in 2005 as a BT Sponsored Research Student.
Konstantinos Kaparis
Konstantinos (Dinos) Kaparis is a Lecturer in Operations Research and Mathematics at Lancaster University. He obtained his PhD from the University of Southampton and is a winner of the 2009 Operational Research Society Shield for the ‘Most Distinguished Body of Research leading to the Award of a Doctorate in the field of OR’.