Undoubtedly, the most urgent task for companies today is to take a hard look at the future. To remain competitive, management must nurture a strong capability for self development and a strong corporate culture, both of which form part of the foundation for improvement. But simply understanding management techniques doesn't mean you know how to use them. You need the tools and technologies for implementation.

"In Building Organizational Fitness, "Ryuji Fukuda extends the power of his managerial engineering methodology into the context of the top management strategic planning role. Published here for the first time, the author provides information on the evolution of his CEDAC methods for use in strategic planning and implementation. The book introduces several key management technologies and describes their successful application in many Japanese, American and European companies, including: P/O (Policy Objective) Matrix, SEDAC (Structure for Enhancing Daily Activities through Creativity), Window Analysis ( a method for classifying and analyzing problem for a view point of management actions required), and Stockless Production (an approach to reduce work-in-process and lead time in an effective and easy-to-understand manner).

Fatigue and Fracture Reliability Engineering is an attempt to present an integrated and unified approach to reliability determination of fatigue and fracture behaviour, incorporating probability, statistics and other related areas. A series of original and practical approaches, are suggested in Fatigue and Fracture Reliability Engineering, including new techniques in determining fatigue and fracture performances. It also carries out an investigation into static and fatigue properties, and into the failure mechanisms of unnotched and notched CFR composite laminates with different lay-ups to optimize the stacking sequence effect. Further benefits include: a novel convergence-divergence counting procedure to extract all load cycles from a load history of divergence-convergence waves; practical scatter factor formulae to determine the safe fatigue crack initiation and propagation lives from the results of a single full-scale test of a complete structure; and a nonlinear differential kinetic model for describing the dynamical behaviour of an atom at a fatigue crack tip. Fatigue and Fracture Reliability Engineering is intended for practising engineers in marine, civil construction, aerospace, offshore, automotive and chemical industries. It is also useful reading for researchers on doctoral programmes, and is appropriate for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate programmes in any mechanically-oriented engineering discipline.

The author of this book made an attempt to create the general theory of optimization of linear systems (both distributed and lumped) with a singular control. The book touches upon a wide range of issues such as solvability of boundary values problems for partial differential equations with generalized right-hand sides, the existence of optimal controls, the necessary conditions of optimality, the controllability of systems, numerical methods of approximation of generalized solutions of initial boundary value problems with generalized data, and numerical methods for approximation of optimal controls. In particular, the problems of optimization of linear systems with lumped controls (pulse, point, pointwise, mobile and so on) are investigated in detail.

Aiming to change the paradigms of traditional management strategies, this work attempts to create an improved platform within the total quality management umbrella for supporting the profit motive by offering hands-on instructions for applying the theory of constraints in the manufacturing system. The book provides updated information in each area discussed.

This text presents the practical application of queueing theory results for the design and analysis of manufacturing and production systems. This textbook makes accessible to undergraduates and beginning graduates many of the seemingly esoteric results of queueing theory. In an effort to apply queueing theory to practical problems, there has been considerable research over the previous few decades in developing reasonable approximations of queueing results. This text takes full advantage of these results and indicates how to apply queueing approximations for the analysis of manufacturing systems. Support is provided through the web site http://msma.tamu.edu. Students will have access to the answers of odd numbered problems and instructors will be provided with a full solutions manual, Excel files when needed for homework, and computer programs using Mathematica that can be used to solve homework and develop additional problems or term projects. In this second edition a separate appendix dealing with some of the basic event-driven simulation concepts has been added.

Providing an understanding of what is meant by quality and its unique position in a manufacturing environment to improve competitive business performance, this text defines all the fundamental ingredients required to introduce an improvement in quality. Concise and easy to read, the theory is backed up by numerous industrial experiences, illustrating the practical obstacles when implementing any quality change. Focusing on the essentials of quality (strategies, principles and techniques) designing for quality is also discussed and new techniques for assessing the risks and costs of non-conformance are introduced. The result is an insight to quality engineering that will prove invaluable to engineering students and professionals.

The interaction between engineering and the law is undergoing dramatic changes. Product liability, laws have been introduced in Japan, patent claims over living organisms have been made in bioengineering and the differing national laws of copyright protection and liability are in the process of harmonisation, especially in the European Union. The pace and complexity of these changes make it essential for technologists, lawyers, engineers and insurance experts to establish a common basis for understanding, co-operation and exchange of expertise. The recently founded International Society for Technology, Law and Insurance aims to foster such co-operation. This volume features 46 selected contributions which address various topical issues and the law. The most important issues relate to engineering risks, quality assurance and assessment and legal implications assiciated with them. Recent failure cases are explained and the technical, legal and insurance-related issues discussed in detail.

Today, every engineer interested in manufacturing should have a firm grasp of computer architecture and how digital controllers are interfaced to electromechanical processes to gather information and control machines. The theories of continuous control and discrete control, and their application in manufacturing, are fundamental to designing and working with the next generation of manufacturing systems. The purpose of Computer Automation in Manufacturing: An introduction is to provide a broad introduction to digital control technology and its application in manufacturing automation. It covers the application of this technology from the machine level through the manufacturing cell and shop floor levels, provides broad coverage of subjects beginning with the architecture of computers and controllers, and ends with shop floor applications. Written specifically for engineering students, the book does not require a specialized background and can be used as early as the third year of an undergraduate engineering program. Readers will appreciate the broad scope and integration of topics, as well as the provision of numerous end-of-chapter problem sets.

This book provides practical guidance and awareness for a growing body of knowledge developing across a variety of disciplines and many countries. This book is a celebration of the Gavriel Salvendy International Symposium (GSIS) and provides a survey of topics and emerging areas of interest in human-automation interaction. This book for the GSIS emphasizes main thematic areas: manufacturing, services and user experience. Main areas of coverage include Section A: Advanced Production Management and Production Control; Section B: Healthcare Automation; Section C: Measuring and Modeling Human Performance; Section D: Usability and User Experience; Section E: Safety Management and Occupational Ergonomics; Section F: Manufacturing and Services; Section G: Data and Probabilistic Information; Section H: Training and Collaboration Technologies. Contributions from especially early career researchers were featured as part of this (virtual) symposium and celebration. Gavriel Salvendy initiated the conferences that run annually as Human-Computer Interaction International and Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics International (AHFE), both within the Lecture Notes in Springer. The book is inclusive of human-computer interaction and human factors and ergonomics principles, yet it is intended to serve a much wider audience that has interest in automation and human modeling. The emerging need for human-automation interaction expertise has developed from an ever-growing availability and presence of automation in our everyday lives.

This book provides up-to-date information about the promising use of feature technology for integrating computer-aided-design with subsequent applications. The book consists of 20 articles based upon the international IFIP conference on this topic held in Valenciennes, France in May 1994.

Stressing the theory involved in formulating suspensions, emulsions, and colloidal drug products, this Second Edition of a well-received reference test highlights typical formulations, the avoidance of formulation pitfalls, and compliance with established regulatory principles.

The requirements for production systems are constantly changing as a result of changing competitive conditions. This poses a challenge for manufacturers in the various branches of industry and creates an ever-increasing need for flexibility.

With this as a background, this book explores the current developments and trends as well as their impact on today's production systems. It also compares known strategies, concepts and methods used to achieve production flexibility. Similarly, the practical knowledge and current research will be drawn upon and subjected to a sound scientific analysis, through which the technical and organizational flexibility ranges can be measured in their application in a production system. The convenience and usefulness of this concept for manufacturers is substantiated by its implementation in a software tool called ecoFLEX and its practical application, based on extensive examples. This illustrates how flexibility flaws can be quickly identified, classified and properly disposed of using ecoFLEX. This tool helps to close the gap between ERP / PPS systems and digital factory planning tools.

The 6th meeting sponsored by IFIP Working Group 7.5, on reliability and optimization of structural systems, took place in September 1994 in Assisi, Italy. This book contains the papers presented at the working conference including topics such as reliability of special structures, fatigue, failure modes and time-variant systems relibility.

This book reports research findings and outcome from various discipline of engineering and technology, focusing on industrial technology operation and sustainable development. The content is the results of research done at the Research and Innovation Section of the Universiti Kuala Lumpur - MITEC as well as several experts from other institutions in Malaysia. The content describes the latest knowledge and development aligned with current trends of industrial technology operation in Malaysia.

This book is intended to give a general overview of reliability, faults, fault models, nanotechnology, nanodevices, fault-tolerant architectures and reliability evaluation techniques. Additionally, the book provides an in depth state-of-the-art research results and methods for fault tolerance as well as the methodology for designing fault-tolerant systems out of highly unreliable components.

Appropriate for beginning graduate level courses on linear systems, graduate courses introducing linear control, and for self-study.

The basic theory of linear systems is developed in a unified, accessible, and careful manner, with parallel, independent treatment of continuous-time and discrete-time linear systems. Modest mathematical background is assumed, and the technical presentation is explicit and step-by-step. There are many examples to help the reader, and carefully chosen exercises. Includes extensive, annotated citations. The presentation has been repeatedly class tested and refined.

Discusses the requirements for establishing, maintaining and revitalizing an efficient engineering documentation control system for use by technical and manufacturing personnel in private industry. The book stresses simplicity and common sense in the development and implementation of all control practices, procedures and forms. A list of effective interchangeability rules, a glossary of essential engineering documentation terms and an extensive bibliography of key literature sources are provided.;This work is intended for mechanical, computer, design, manufacturing and civil engineers; program, purchasing and documentation and production control managers; and upper-level undergraduate, graduate and continuing-education students in these fields.

The book presents a comprehensive treatment on a novel design theory that fosters innovative thinking and creativity essential for addressing wicked problems. Wicked problems are ill-defined, ambiguous in both aims and solutions, and complex with interconnected and intertwined (coupled) factors. While being ubiquitous and difficult, however, wicked problems share characteristics common to science and design in three regards, namely agent finitude, system complexity, and problem normativity. These fundamental attributes allow a core cognitive process common to design and science to be identified and a strategic problem-solving conception of methodology be formulated as a result. The theory facilitates new opportunities for synergetic cross-disciplinary research and practice by incorporating the essences of Extenics to axiomatic design. Innovative thinking is enabled by exploring Extenics for problem reframing, paradigm shift, and abductive reasoning and by engaging axiomatic design in the co-evolution (iteration) of the need and viable design concept. The theory is unique in that it is a framework for quantifying imprecise and vague design information available during the conceptual design stage as mathematical expression and algorithm early in the design effort and enables the objective evaluation and emergence of an optimal design concept from among multitude of viable ones. The book is conceived for students and real-world practitioners in engineering, natural and social sciences, business, and fine arts who seek to develop powerful design thinking for solving problems in a creative and innovative way.

This book provides an overview of advanced manufacturing technology in Japan. It describes the prevalent manufacturing engineering concepts and highlights the current applications, technologies and systems in Japanese manufacturing industry.

The kinds of management systems typically used in large companies throw up many roadblocks to innovation. This book compares the management systems of highly innovative companies with those of more typical companies and shows how they are different. Twenty different aspects of management are compared, from organization structure to communications systems to incentives to project funding systems.

Examines all important aspects of integrated circuit design, fabrication, assembly and test processes as they relate to quality and reliability. This second edition discusses in detail: the latest circuit design technology trends; the sources of error in wafer fabrication and assembly; avenues of contamination; new IC packaging methods; new in-line process monitors and test structures; and more.;This work should be useful to electrical and electronics, quality and reliability, and industrial engineers; computer scientists; integrated circuit manufacturers; and upper-level undergraduate, graduate and continuing-education students in these disciplines.

Particulate products make up around 80% of chemical products, from all industry sectors. Examples given in this book include the construction materials, fine ceramics and concrete; the delicacies, chocolate and ice cream; pharmaceutical, powders, medical inhalers and sun screen; liquid and powder paints. Size distribution and the shape of the particles provide for different functionalities in these products. Some functions are general, others specific. General functions are powder flow and require at the typical particulate concentrations of these products that the particles cause adequate rheological behavior during processing and/or for product performance. Therefore, this book addresses particle packing as well as its relation to powder flow and rheological behavior. Moreover, general relationships to particle size are discussed for e.g. color and sensorial aspects of particulate products. Product-specific functionalities are often relevant for comparable product groups. Particle size distribution and shape provide, for example, the following functionalities:

- dense particle packing in relation to sufficient strength is required in concrete construction, ceramic objects and pharmaceutical tablets

- good sensorial properties (mouthfeel) to chocolate and ice cream

- effective dissolution, flow and compression properties for pharmaceutical powders

- adequate hiding power and effective coloring of paints for protection and the desired esthetical appeal of the objects

- adequate protection of our body against sun light by sunscreen

- effective particle transport and deposition to desired locations for medical inhalers and powder paints.

Adequate particle size distribution, shape and porosity of particulate products have to be achieved in order to reach optimum product performance. This requires adequate management of design and development as well as sufficient knowledge of the underlying principles of physics and chemistry. Moreover, flammability, explosivity and other health hazards from powders, during handling, are taken into account. This is necessary, since great risks may be involved. In all aspects, the most relevant parameters of the size distribution (and particle shape) have to be selected.

In this book, experts in the different product fields have contributed to the product chapters. This provides optimum information on what particulate aspects are most relevant for behavior and performance within specified industrial products and how optimum results can be obtained. It differs from other books in the way that the critical aspects of different products are reported, so that similarities and differences can be identified. We trust that this approach will lead to improved optimization in design, development and quality of many particulate products."

This book covers central issues in mitigating supply chain risks from various perspectives. Today's supply chains are vulnerable to disruptions that can have a significant impact on firms, business and performance. The aim of supply chain risk management is to identify the potential sources of risks and implement appropriate actions in order to mitigate supply chain disruptions. In this regard, the book presents a wealth of methods, strategies and analyses that are essential for mitigating supply chain risks. As a comprehensive collection of the latest research and cutting-edge developments in supply chain risk and its mitigation, the book is structured into four main parts, addressing supply chain risk strategies and developments; supply chain risk management review; supply chain sustainability and resilience; and supply chain analysis and risk management applications. The contributing authors are leading academic researchers and practitioners, who combine findings and research results with a practical and contemporary view on how companies can best manage supply chain risks and disruptions, as well as how to create resilient and sustainable supply chains. This book can be used as an essential resource for students and scholars who are interested in pursuing research or teaching courses on the rapidly growing field of supply chain management. It also offers an interesting and informative read for managers and practitioners who need to deepen their understanding of effective supply chain risk management.

This book contains selected papers from International Symposium for Production Research 2022, held on October 6-9, 2022, Turkey. The book reports recent advances in production engineering and operations. It explores topics including: production research; production management; operations management; industry 4.0; industrial engineering; mechanical engineering; engineering management; and operational research. Presenting real-life applications, case studies, and mathematical models, this book is of interest to researchers, academics, and practitioners in the field of production and operation engineering. It provides both the results of recent research and practical solutions to real-world problems.

This book reports on innovative research and practices in contemporary design, showing how to integrate different concepts and discussing the emerging role of design in different field, its meaning for humans and citizens, at both local and global level. Gathering the best papers from Senses & Sensibility, held in 2019 in Lisbon, Portugal, it highlights the role of design in fostering education, physical and social wellbeing, industrial innovation and cultural preservation, as well as inclusivity, sustainability and communication in a global, digital world.