Supply chain temple of resilience

In March 2011, an earthquake and tsunami hit the north-eastern coastline of Japan. Honda, Toyota, Nissan and Subaru all had plants in or close to the affected region, and were forced to close them

RFID Demystified: Part 3. Company Case Studies.

In the previous two parts of RFID Demystified we have discussed the technology, possible benefits and areas of application for with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems. In this final part we review Company Case-Studies of those who have decided to apply the technology within their organisation. It will be seen that considerable benefits are being experienced within some organisations, pilot applications are increasing our learning and providing a foundation for the future success of projects in this area

Understanding collaborative supply chain relationships through the application of the Williamson organisational failure framework

Many researchers have studied supply chain relationships however, the preponderance of open markets situations and ‘industry-style’ surveys have reduced the empirical focus on the dynamics of long-term, collaborative dyadic relationships. Within the supply chain the need for much closer, long-term relationships is increasing due to supplier rationalisation and globalisation (Spekman et al, 1998) and more information about these interactions is required. The research specifically tested the well-accepted Williamson’s (1975) Economic Organisations Failure Framework as a theoretical model through which long term collaborative relationships can be

Long Term Collaborative Business Relationships: The Impact of Trust and C3 Behaviour

Long-term, collaborative business relationships are like marriages where tolerance, forbearance and some reduction of freedom as well as innovation are necessary to ensure success. Trust and co-operative behaviours are known to be essential ingredients in securing an environment of continuous improvement but, how they are correlated has yet to be tested. The paper describes a research project within a sample of long-term monopoly businesses as a novel approach to bringing trust and cooperation, co-ordination and collaboration (C3 Behaviour) into sharper focus without competitive distractions. It was found that a correlation between trust and C3 Behaviour and the success of the collaborative relationship exists

Accurate simulation estimates of phase behaviour in ternary mixtures with prescribed composition

This paper describes an isobaric semi-grand canonical ensemble Monte Carlo scheme for the accurate study of phase behaviour in ternary fluid mixtures under the experimentally relevant conditions of prescribed pressure, temperature and overall composition. It is shown how to tune the relative chemical potentials of the individual components to target some requisite overall composition and how, in regions of phase coexistence, to extract accurate estimates for the compositions and phase fractions of individual coexisting phases. The method is illustrated by tracking a path through the composition space of a model ternary Lennard-Jones mixture.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure

A liquid state theory that remains successful in the critical region

A thermodynamically self-consistent Ornstein-Zernike approximation (SCOZA) is applied to a fluid of spherical particles with a pair potential given by a hard-core repulsion and a Yukawa attractive tail $w(r)=-\exp [-z(r-1)]/r$. This potential allows one to take advantage of the known analytical properties of the solution to the Ornstein-Zernike equation for the case in which the direct correlation function outside the repulsive core is given by a linear combination of two Yukawa tails and the radial distribution function $g(r)$ satisfies the exact core condition $g(r)=0$ for $r<1$. The predictions for the thermodynamics, the critical point, and the coexistence curve are compared here to other theories and to simulation results. In order to unambiguously assess the ability of the SCOZA to locate the critical point and the phase boundary of the system, a new set of simulations has also been performed. The method adopted combines Monte Carlo and finite-size scaling techniques and is especially adapted to deal with critical fluctuations and phase separation. It is found that the version of the SCOZA considered here provides very good overall thermodynamics and a remarkably accurate critical point and coexistence curve. For the interaction range considered here, given by $z=1.8$, the critical density and temperature predicted by the theory agree with the simulation results to about 0.6%.Comment: Prepared for the John Barker festschrift issue of Molecular Physics. 22 pages Latex, 6 ps figure

Liquid-gas phase behaviour of an argon-like fluid modelled by the hard-core two-Yukawa potential

We study a model for an argon-like fluid parameterised in terms of a hard-core repulsion and a two-Yukawa potential. The liquid-gas phase behaviour of the model is obtained from the thermodynamically self-consistent Ornstein-Zernike approximation (SCOZA) of Hoye and Stell, the solution of which lends itself particularly well to a pair potential of this form. The predictions for the critical point and the coexistence curve are compared to new high resolution simulation data and to other liquid-state theories, including the hierarchical reference theory (HRT) of Parola and Reatto. Both SCOZA and HRT deliver results that are considerably more accurate than standard integral-equation approaches. Among the versions of SCOZA considered, the one yielding the best agreement with simulation successfully predicts the critical point parameters to within 1%.Comment: 10 pages 6 figure