A Critical Evaluation of Demand Forecast on a Company's Supply Chain (A Case Study of A.P. Moller - Maersk Group)

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 01: INTRODUCTION1

1.1Background2

1.2Aim of the study5

1.3Objectives6

1.4Research Questions7

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW8

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY10

3.1Data Types10

3.2Data Collection11

3.2.1Quantitative Data12

3.2.2Qualitative Data12

3.3Population Sampling12

3.4Sampling Techniques13

3.5Data Analysis13

3.6Data Collection Method13

3.7Sampling Issues and Population14

3.8Validity15

3.8.1Ethical Issues15

3.9Limitations15

3.10De-Limitations15

3.11Expenses16

3.12Schedule16

REFERENCES17

CHAPTER 01: INTRODUCTION

The process of the demand forecasting is gaining in more momentum because it is about the prediction of the future needs and what they will require in the future. It is all about proper planning for the process of the inventories, resources, data, raw materials and every thing related to the supply chain. It is more significant for the growth of the firm because the more they effectively plan their resources the more cost is going to be minimized on their inventories. As more amount of the inventories are going to be prevented and the wastage of the cycles in the non productive process is going to be eliminated the resulting system will be very efficient and provide a better support for reducing the operating cost. Any firm must know its current position in the market, its growth rate, sales and the emerging trends. Only when it knows the current growth it can plan for the future expansion and thus decide for its future. Thus, forecasting is very much essential for the firm (Yu-Lee, 2002). In this process of the demand forecasting firms are experiencing problems because their prediction some times fails and they end up in purchasing some materials which doesn't sell well and this cause a huge loss for the firm.

The only way to solve this issue is to go in for the process of the IT infrastructure and following of more advanced software tools which will help in predicting the future needs and the requirements of the people. Once the future needs are known any firm can plan what they need and prove a competitor advantage over the others. They also face major issue in choosing the appropriate tools for the process of the forecasting. This process is done based on the A.P.MOLLER - MAERSK GROUP and they are involved in the major use of the efficient planning of their supply chain and this work is based on how they forecast the future demands and also on the current issues in the forecasting. Always planning for the process of meeting the demands by either decreasing their capacity or serving in a cyclic fashion helps in the process of the capacity planning for the firm thus in any firm they need to plan for the short term needs with the available capacity in hand - this is coined as the capacity management (Dechter, 2004).

It is in this area of capacity management the current problems are occurring in the Moller groups; and this work aims to solve these issues for the better process of the supply chain. When ever there is a huge demand the customers are made to wait and this can only be solved by proper scheduling and ...