The short 3 months spent in Kyushu University under the KUARO research program has left me with such an unforgettable time. With tons of sweet memories, I am very sure that I will go back to Fukuoka again one day! Being the first student on such a research collaboration, I have to admit that it was tough at the start especially with the intensive Japanese classes and the difficulty of expressing myself to others in Japanese. But the toughness was short-lived and it became a challenge, as very quickly I found many Japanese friends who helped me and who were kind enough to listen patiently to my atrocious Japanese and who encouraged me to put in more effort.
Dr. Furukawa, my supervisor from the Economic Engineering Department, is especially nice to me. He was an excellent supervisor for my project on the supply chain management and albeit the short duration and his busy schedules, we managed to co-author a research paper on the influence of RFID on the Supply Chain Management. Dr. Shimizu of the International Student Center has also taken her precious time off to give me private Japanese classes to ensure that I could catch up with the ongoing class. I also enjoyed spending time doing research in the laboratory on level 3 with the masters students who not only helped me in getting used to school life but also showed me the real Japanese cultures with so much fun.
Outside school, I fell in love with Fukuoka city and mentaiko (cod ovum), well to be more precise mentaiko onigiri (rice ball with cod ovum). Life in Fukuoka city was great and I would like to thank everyone who has made all this possible for me. Arigatou gozaimashita! Taihen osewani narimashita. (Thank you very much. Thank you for your trouble).
In an increasingly cost constrained environment, companies are focusing more than ever on efficiency and cost reduction throughout their organizations and have spent millions of dollars re-engineering their supply.
Partners are replacing suppliers, the implementation of innovative new technology and ideas can now deliver what was once just a vision of the future: A truly Collaborative, Integrated, Visible and Responsive Supply Chain. Our research attempts to take the traditional Supply Chain one step further and examines the latest RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology companies need to achieve a fully integrated network of partners and ultimately reduce costs across the supply chain. The benefits of the application of the new technologies across the Supply Chain would be first studied by quantifying the bullwhip effects for a simple 4-tier supply chain model.
Simulating POS (Point of Sales) visibility across the supply chain enabled by the RFID, we extend the model to demonstrate that the bullwhip effect could be reduced and the service levels would be improved. As predicted, the manufacturer at the upstream of the supply chain tends to benefit most and has been generally advocated to bear the cost of the RFIDs. However, in this research it is found that the relative proportion of benefits across the chain depends largely on the type of demand function and thus the upstream elements do not necessary have to bear the majority of the cost of the RFIDs.
