Aligning demand and supply flexibility in custom product co-design

Flexibility of supply and demand is essential for successful implementation of a mass customization strategy that delivers sustained competitive advantage. Supply flexibility, i.e., a choice of alternative products designed to perform the same basic function, is made possible by the range of capabilities available in flexible and agile manufacturing systems and in supply chains. Demand flexibility is derived from the degree to which a customer is willing to compromise on product features or performance levels in order to meet budgetary (reflected in price) or schedule (reflected in delivery) constraints. Flexibility of both supply and demand can have significant strategic and financial value if they are properly aligned. However, customers are mostly unaware of mapping of demand flexibility on to supply flexibility and its impact on production cost and time. Recent advances in information technology have made it possible to co-design a product that involves customer on one end and the manufacturer on the other. This creates an aura and an opportunity where a middle ground between the supply and demand flexibility can be explored and a “deal” can be struck where both parties settle for a product that is beneficial to both through a negotiated settlement. In this paper, we develop a framework for such negotiations. The customer requirements are treated as a range of negotiable options instead of a set of fixed inputs. Demand and supply for customization is then matched by aligning the flexibility of manufacturing systems with customers’ requirement options. Based on this framework, a negotiation scheme is developed to assist customers and manufacturers in exploring and utilizing demand and supply flexibility information in co-design. The negotiation scheme is formulated using goal programming. Finally, an interactive problem-solving procedure is developed and implemented with an illustrative example.     

From mass customization to mass personalization: a strategic transformation

Business and operations strategists have long sought to formulate strategies that would serve profitably for a market of one. Two decades after its conception, there is growing evidence that mass customization strategy is transforming into a mass personalization strategy, making the market of one a reality, at least in select industries. The degree of transformation of a company depends on the extent to which its product is soft, i.e., can be produced electronically. Thus, at the lower end of the personalization spectrum are manufacturing companies engaged in producing hard, configurable products, while on the high end of the spectrum are service companies whose product can be totally configured and delivered electronically. The underlying factors that are enabling this transformation, in our view, are: (1) development of information technologies such as peer to peer (P2P), business to consumer (B2C), and Web 2.0, (2) near-universal availability of the Internet, (3) customer willingness and preparedness to be integrated into the process of product co-design and co-creation, (4) modern manufacturing systems, such as flexible manufacturing and, of course, (5) mass customization tools such as modularity and delayed differentiation, which help reduce manufacturing cost and cycle times and (6) deployment of customer-satisfaction-specific software called customer relationship management (CRM) to engender customer retention. Due to the importance and strategic success of affordable personalization, this issue is dedicated to that theme. The articles included in this issue would, I believe, serve as significant decision support mechanisms for companies pursuing a mass customization and personalization strategy. In addition to providing a brief perspective on articles included in this issue, we also summarize the state of the art of mass customization research.     

A dynamic heuristic-based algorithm to part input sequencing in flexible manufacturing systems for mass customization capability

In the increasingly competitive global markets, enterprises face challenges in responding to customer orders quickly, as well as producing customized products cost-effectively. This paper proposes a dynamic heuristic-based algorithm for the part input sequencing problem of flexible manufacturing systems (FMSs) in a mass customization (MC) environment. The FMS manufactures a variety of parts, and customer orders arrive dynamically with order size as small as one. Segmental set functions are established in the proposed algorithm to apply the strategy of dynamic workload balancing, and the shortest processing time (SPT) scheduling rule. Theoretical analysis is performed and the effectiveness of the algorithm in dynamic workload balancing under the complex and dynamic environment is proven. The application of the algorithm is illustrated by an example. The potential of its practical applications to the FMSs in make-to-order (MTO) supply chains is also discussed. Further research is provided.     

Analytical affective design with ambient intelligence for mass customization and personalization

The fulfillment of individual customer affective needs may award the producer extra premium in gaining a competitive edge. This entails a number of technical challenges to be addressed, such as the elicitation, evaluation, and fulfillment of affective needs, as well as the evaluation of affordability of producers to launch the planned products. Mass customization and personalization have been recognized as an effective means to enhance front-end customer satisfaction while maintaining back-end production efficiency. This paper proposes an affective design framework to facilitate decision-making in designing customized product ecosystems. In particular, ambient intelligence techniques are applied to elicit affective customer needs. An analytical model is proposed to support affective design analysis. Utility measure and conjoint analysis are employed to quantify affective satisfaction, while the producer affordability is evaluated using an affordability index. Association rule mining techniques are applied to model the mapping of affective needs to design elements. Configuration design of product ecosystems is optimized with a heuristic genetic algorithm. A case study of Volvo truck cab design is reported with a focus on the customization of affective features. It is demonstrated that the analytical affective design framework can effectively manage the elicitation, analysis, and fulfillment of affective customer needs. Meanwhile, it can account for the manufacturer’s capabilities, which is vital for ensuring a profit margin in the mass customization and personalization endeavor.     

Mass Customization in Videotape Duplication and Conversion: Challenges of Flexible Duplication Systems,Fast Delivery,and Electronic Service

With the emergence of electronic commerce technology, marketers gained new methods for personalizing electronic advertisements, automating marketing research, and customizing product designs. These developments suggest that production operations also must be redesigned to support contemporary marketing objectives via mass customization. Yet, operations management research historically has focused on mass production systems buffering the customer from production operations. As such, the literature provides relatively few insights about managing mass customization operations. Thus, in this paper, we consider a previously unexamined type of mass customization production operations. The paper presents a case study of a manufacturer's videotape duplication and conversion system, consisting of a flexible network of heterogeneous, parallel machines used to duplicate and convert videotapes and other multimedia. We describe the characteristics of this flexible duplication system, discuss parallels between these systems and mass customization, and identify issues regarding flexibility, speed of delivery, and electronic service.     

Observations on the present and future of mass customization

A demanding task for many companies today is that of learning to regard customers as individuals, of proactively developing products and services according to the individual customer preferences, and of subsequently producing and distributing these offerings. Over the last decade, mass customization has emerged as an effective approach for tackling precisely this task. In this paper, I discuss the background of mass customization and the elements of this strategy. I will then comment on the implementation of mass customization in practice. I will end with a brief discussion of alternative strategies in this domain, namely personalization and matching services.     

Two shades of boldness: novel object and anti-predator behavior reflect different personality dimensions in domestic rabbits

It is increasingly common to quantify and describe behavioral variation in domestic and wild animals in terms of “personality”. Correlating behavioral traits are referred to as personality “dimensions” or “factors” and different dimensions have been reported in different species. “Boldness” is a well-described personality dimension in several species, although some issues remain unclear. Previous models of boldness include both novelty and risk taking, but recent studies indicate that these types of behaviors may reflect separate personality dimensions. In this study, we developed a behavioral test battery for domestic rabbits, and recorded behaviors of 61 individuals in four different situations (novel object, novel arena, social, and predator interactions). We used domestic rabbits as a model because behavioral variation in rabbits has rarely been quantified in terms of personality dimensions, although rabbit behavior is described. We also wanted to investigate behavioral variation in a Swedish rabbit breed of conservation concern — the Gotland rabbit. Factor analysis of the behavioral test measures suggested three personality dimensions: “exploration”, “boldness”, and “anxiety”. Novel object scores clustered in the exploration and boldness factors, whereas scores associated with predator interactions were explained by “anxiety”, indicating that novel object and anti-predator behavior reflect different personality dimensions in rabbits.     

Mass customization research: trends,directions, diffusion intensity,and taxonomic frameworks

Mass customization (MC) as a business strategy is designed to simultaneously compete on two rival competitive priorities—the price and customization level of a product. MC academics and experts have gone a step further. They suggest that MC is a unique strategy whose implementation promises across-the-board improvement in all four of the competitive priorities (price, quality, flexibility, and speed) simultaneously. Its growing adoption by businesses in recent years, the steep rise in success stories associated with MC, and the voluminous body of publications in a short period of its existence have created a need to study the directions, trends, application potential, and research strategies embedded in these publications. Accordingly, this paper studies and analyzes the trends and directions of the research published in 1,124 MC publications that have appeared in journals and magazines since the inception of the term mass customization in 1987 by Stan Davis in his classic book Future Perfect. Statistical trend analyses are conducted to study the vitality and health of the field of MC using number of publications and number of publication outlets and their respective trends. The publication outlet data conform to an S curve, establishing maturity of the MC field. The publication data show that the MC field has passed through four stages of growth: incubation or slow (1987–1992), exponential (1993–2003), stable and matured (2003–2005). There is a slight dip in 2006 in terms of publication outlets; there are, however, confirmatory factors that indicate that the dip in 2006 may be an outlier. This paper also suggests developing a clear understanding of the value and type of research embodied in MC publications through three types of taxonomic analyses. The frameworks for all three taxonomies are set forth, two of which have been previously employed in other areas of OR/MS (Reisman and Kirschnik, Oper Res 42(4):577–588, 1994; Oper Res 43(5):731–740, 1995): The first taxonomic framework first classifies the paper as a theory paper or an application paper. At the second stage, the application content of the publication is determined based on a five-point scale ranging from simple modeling of the real world to bona fide real-world application. The second taxonomic framework suggests usage of a taxonomy comprised of seven distinct types of research strategies. The former analysis provides important information about the application worthiness of the MC publications and hence their usefulness to the real world. The second analysis provides information about the type of research strategies used by MC researchers, which, in turn, allows drawing conclusions about the quality and rigor of such research. The third taxonomic framework suggested recommends classification of all publications among multi-level containers based on the disciplines that intersect with MC and their branches.     

Process Variety Modeling for Process Configuration in Mass Customization: An Approach Based on Object-Oriented Petri Nets with Changeable Structures

Mass customization strategies could be usefully deployed by companies whose products are characterized by a modular design. Typically, each module serves a specific aspect of the overall product function at varying performance levels. Each product variant (constructed through a unique combination of modular performance levels), therefore, serves to customize the overall performance of the product, thus serving the unique needs of each customer. The high demand for each module guarantees economies of scale and, eventually, low cost to customer. The rationale of configuring production processes for producing individual product variants originates from the fact that massive process data is commonly available in a firm and there exists a generic process structure underlying the production of similar products in a family. To design a decision support mechanism that constructs process configuration corresponding to a given product configuration, this paper develops a formal modeling of process variety using Petri nets. Object-oriented Petri nets (PNs) with changeable structures (OPNs-CS) are applied to deal with the issues of generic representation, constraints compliance, and operational sequence requirements. Object-oriented PN (OPN) models facilitate generic representation of product and process variety as well as their instantiations. The OPNs-CS model is tested with simulation. Based on simulation results, the optimal configuration of production processes can be determined for each individual product as well as the cohort of a product family. To illustrate the feasibility and potential of OPNs-CS based process variety modeling, a case study of process configuration for mass customized textile spindles is reported.     

Curing “Moral Disability”: Brain Trauma and Self-Control in Victorian Science and Fiction

While, historically, the disabled body has appeared in literature as “monstrous,” burgeoning psychological theories of the Victorian period predicated an unusual shift. In a culture of sexual anxiety and fears of devolution and moral decay, the physically disabled and “weak” are portrayed as strangely free from moral corruption. Unlike the cultural link between deviance and disability witnessed in the medical literature and eugenic approach to generation, authors of narrative fiction—particularly Charles Dickens, but Wilkie Collins, Charlotte Yonge, and others as well—portray disabled characters as “purified,” and trauma itself as potentially sanitizing. This present paper argues that such constructions were made possible by developments in the treatment of insanity. “Curing ‘Moral Disability’: Brain Trauma and Self-Control in Victorian Fiction,” examines the concept of trauma-as-cure. Throughout the Victorian period, case studies on brain trauma appeared in widely circulated journals like the Lancet, concurrently with burgeoning theories about psychological disturbance and “moral insanity.” While not widely practiced until the early twentieth century, attempts at surgical “cures” aroused curiosity and speculation—the traumatic event that could free sufferers from deviance. This work provides a unique perspective on representations of disability as cure in the nineteenth century as a means of giving voice to the marginalized, disabled, and disempowered.     

What does body size mean,from the “plant's eye view”?

Alternative metrics exist for representing variation in plant body size, but the vast majority of previous research for herbaceous plants has focused on dry mass. Dry mass provides a reasonably accurate and easily measured estimate for comparing relative capacity to convert solar energy into stored carbon. However, from a “plant's eye view”, its experience of its local biotic environment of immediate neighbors (especially when crowded) may be more accurately represented by measures of “space occupancy” (S–O) recorded in situ—rather than dry mass measured after storage in a drying oven. This study investigated relationships between dry mass and alternative metrics of S–O body size for resident plants sampled from natural populations of herbaceous species found in Eastern Ontario. Plant height, maximum lateral canopy extent, and estimated canopy area and volume were recorded in situ (in the field)—and both fresh and dry mass were recorded in the laboratory—for 138 species ranging widely in body size and for 20 plants ranging widely in body size within each of 10 focal species. Dry mass and fresh mass were highly correlated (r² > .95) and isometric, suggesting that for some studies, between‐species (or between‐plant) variation in water content may be unimportant and fresh mass can therefore substitute for dry mass. However, several relationships between dry mass and other S–O body size metrics showed allometry—that is, plants with smaller S–O body size had disproportionately less dry mass. In other words, they have higher “body mass density” (BMD) — more dry mass per unit S–O body size. These results have practical importance for experimental design and methodology as well as implications for the interpretation of “reproductive economy”—the capacity to produce offspring at small body sizes—because fecundity and dry mass (produced in the same growing season) typically have a positive, isometric relationship. Accordingly, the allometry between dry mass and S–O body size reported here suggests that plants with smaller S–O body size—because of higher BMD—may produce fewer offspring, but less than proportionately so; in other words, they may produce more offspring per unit of body size space occupancy.     

Industrial ecology and the boundaries of the manufacturing firm

Decisions on organizational boundaries are critical aspects of manufacturing firms’ business strategies. This article brings together concepts and findings from industrial ecology and business strategy in order to understand how manufacturing firms engage in initiatives to facilitate recycling of process wastes. Based on a distinction between waste recovery and use of the recovered resources, the article introduces a typology of four different strategies: Closed, Outsourcing, Diversification, and Open. Each strategy has a unique set of organizational boundaries and is associated with different motives and benefits for the manufacturing firm. The typology of strategies provides a conceptual contribution to assist industrial managers in strategic decision‐making, and to support further studies on organizational boundaries in industrial ecology research.     

Measuring the effectiveness of a mass customization and personalization strategy: a market- and organizational-capability-based index

The research of Kumar (Int J Flex Manuf Syst 16(4):287–312, 2004) is expanded to develop a methodology that measures the effectiveness of a mass customization and personalization strategy using a mass customization and personalization effectiveness index. This index extends Kumar (2004) in three significant ways: (1) it encompasses both service and manufacturing companies, (2) the assessment of product customization considers that customers assign different weights to different product features, and (3) the index captures the impact of both market perception and system capabilities. Three different measures are proposed. Which is appropriate should be a function of a particular company’s parameters. The circumstances under which each measure is best is a subject for future research. The validation and reliability of this index and these measures are also issues that should be addressed by future research.     

Predicting body mass of bonobos (Pan paniscus) with human-based morphometric equations

A primate's body mass covaries with numerous ecological, physiological, and behavioral characteristics. This versatility and potential to provide insight into an animal's life has made body mass prediction a frequent and important objective in paleoanthropology. In hominin paleontology, the most commonly employed body mass prediction equations (BMPEs) are “mechanical” and “morphometric”: uni- or multivariate linear regressions incorporating dimensions of load-bearing skeletal elements and stature and living bi-iliac breadth as predictor variables, respectively. The precision and accuracy of BMPEs are contingent on multiple factors, however, one of the most notable and pervasive potential sources of error is extrapolation beyond the limits of the reference sample. In this study, we use a test sample requiring extrapolation—56 bonobos (Pan paniscus) from the Lola ya Bonobo sanctuary in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo—to evaluate the predictive accuracy of human-based morphometric BMPEs. We first assess systemic differences in stature and bi-iliac breadth between humans and bonobos. Due to significant differences in the scaling relationships of body mass and stature between bonobos and humans, we use panel regression to generate a novel BMPE based on living bi-iliac breadth. We then compare the predictive accuracy of two previously published morphometric equations with the novel equation and find that the novel equation predicts bonobo body mass most accurately overall (41 of 56 bonobos predicted within 20% of their observed body mass). The novel BMPE is particularly accurate between 25 and 45 kg. Given differences in limb proportions, pelvic morphology, and body tissue composition between the human reference and bonobo test samples, we find these results promising and evaluate the novel BMPE's potential application to fossil hominins.     

Theoretical electrical conductivity of hydrogen-bonded benzamide-derived molecules and single DNA bases

A benzamide molecule is used as a “reader” molecule to form hydrogen bonds with five single DNA bases, i.e., four normal single DNA bases A,T,C,G and one for 5methylC. The whole molecule is then attached to the gold surface so that a meta-molecule junction is formed. We calculate the transmission function and conductance for the five metal–molecule systems, with the implementation of density functional theory-based non-equilibrium Green function method. Our results show that each DNA base exhibits a unique conductance and most of them are on the pS level. The distinguishable conductance of each DNA base provides a way for the fast sequencing of DNA. We also investigate the dependence of conductivity of such a metal–molecule system on the hydrogen bond length between the “reader” molecule and DNA base, which shows that conductance follows an exponential decay as the hydrogen bond length increases, i.e., the conductivity is highly sensitive to the change in hydrogen bond length.     

Introduction to “Moral (and Other) Laboratories”

“Moral (and other) laboratories” is a special issue that draws on Cheryl Mattingly’s notion of the “moral laboratory” to explore the uncanny interface between laboratory ethnography and moral anthropology, and to examine the relationship between experience and experiment. We ask whether laboratory work may provoke new insights about experimental practices in other social spaces such as homes, clinics, and neighborhoods, and conversely, whether the study of morality may provoke new insights about laboratory practices as they unfold in the day-to-day interactions between test tubes, animals, apparatuses, scientists, and technicians. The papers in this collection examine issues unique to authors’ individual projects, but as a whole, they share a common theme: moral experimentation—the work of finding different ways of relating—occurs in relation to the suffering of something or someone, or in response to some kind of moral predicament that tests cultural and historically shaped “human values.” The collection as a whole intends to push for the theoretical status of not merely experience itself, but also of possibility, in exploring uncertain border zones of various kinds—between the human and the animal, between codified ethical rules and ordinary ethics, and between “real” and metaphorical laboratories.     

Autophagy: Mechanisms, regulation, and its role in tumorigenesis

Autophagy (from Greek “auto” — self, “phagos” — to eat) is the major catabolic process involved in the delivery and lysosomal degradation of long-lived intracellular components: proteins, lipids, nucleic acids, and organelles. Since the discovery of genes involved in regulation of autophagy in the 1990s, there has been a significant increase in studies of autophagy as a process involved in maintaining cellular homeostasis, as well as its role in the development of different pathologies. This review focuses on the basics of autophagy and its regulatory mechanisms. The role of autophagy in the maintenance of cellular homeostasis and tumorigenesis is also discussed.     

The alternative futures of naval force

Abstract

The paper discusses a series of new technologies and new strategic factors entering into naval power and their analytical consequences. The argument is made that (1) traditional ways of identifying “naval power”; no longer have any utility or carry real meaning; (2) current high‐value surface naval forces of declining utility are extremely vulnerable to attack, which will force a radical revaluation in the West of “sea control”; and the costs of such control; and (3) the Soviet Union, by virtue of its geography and its capacity to innovate in “sea denial”; naval force, may be better positioned that the West to take advantage of new antinaval technologies. Western countermeasures may be expensive, involve a radical restructuring of naval force, and mean the acceptance of permanent strategic vulnerability at sea. The “new era”; of naval politics cannot be divorced, analytically and operationally, from emergent space systems and from the strategic nuclear balance.     

Mass Collaboration in Earthquake Risk Management

The mechanism of mass collaboration in risk management was studied during the Sichuan earthquake under a Web-based “PeopleFinder” project, where information is contributed and shared among mass contributors. The case study is provided by a great earthquake that happened in Wenchuan County, Sichuan Province, of southwestern China at 2:28 p.m. on May 12, 2008. We witnessed and experienced the rescue and relief efforts for the great earthquake. In this article, two fundamental frameworks are developed to study the mechanism of mass collaboration. Mass collaboration is proven to be effective in a big public crisis such as the Sichuan earthquake.