Meditech Surgical Case Analysis Paper

Strategic Supply Chain Management

Meditech is a leader in the endoscopic surgical instrument market. The company manufactures and market low cost endoscopy surgical equipment to hospitals and independent surgeons. The company's distribution operation is arranged and managed from a central storage warehouse that ships its products to domestic and international affiliates. The organization have been experiencing a good customer service experience in the past, however, lately customers have expressed concerns with the time products are being delivered to them. Due to the nature of the industry, the delivery of surgical equipment on time is extremely important. The on time delivery of products …show more content…

Meditech can try few alternatives process to reduce demand variation and the possibility of panic ordering. The company should improve how customers ordering is processed, they should more effectively share demand information, and increase lead times on new products. The forecast methods needs to be upgraded to reflect current needs, the company should also introduce vendor managed inventory and an e-commerce web site to share information with its customers. All of these functions should be centralized and shared among all of the supply chain channels that are involve. Another alternative is to transform the finished goods inventory policy into a "push" strategy rather than a "pull" strategy. With improvements in forecasting it would be much cheaper and more efficient with the introduction of new products to stock finished goods inventory based on projected forecasts. By "pushing" products into finished goods Meditech is anticipating the fluctuations in demands that may be caused with the introduction of a new product. Meditech will now have products available exactly when the customer needs them, and will no longer be forced into back order. A
"push" strategy will also allow Meditech be more confident in their inventory policies and should allow them to lower their current inventory policy to a level that is more