Vantage Analytics: Orders Are Piling Up

Operations
medium35 min0 submissions
Goldman Sachs
Scenario

Vantage Analytics is a B2B SaaS operation in India. Demand is 1,169 units per day and rising, but the site is not shipping it. Work-in-progress is accumulating and the plant manager is asking for capital.

The line has four stages, each with its own maximum rate:

StageCapacity
Intake2,141 units/day
Processing830 units/day
Quality check1,471 units/day
Dispatch1,573 units/day

Other facts:

  • The plant manager has requested ₹6 Cr to upgrade the Dispatch stage, because that is where the visible backlog sits
  • Each additional unit shipped contributes ₹508
  • Overtime is available at any stage, at a premium

The site director wants to know whether to approve the request.

Supporting data

proposal

cost
6
stage
Dispatch

economics

contribution per unit
508

derived hints

bottleneck stage
Processing
system throughput
830
unmet demand per day
339
demand units per day1169

stage capacity units per day

intake
2141
dispatch
1573
processing
830
quality check
1471
Your task

Advise the site director. Your answer should provide:

  1. Analysis — what the site's actual throughput is and where the constraint sits, computed.
  2. Risks — what your answer depends on.
  3. Recommendation — where to spend, and the throughput it should buy.

State any assumptions you make.

Ready to move forward? Up next: Wavelength Media: Review This DCF Before It Goes to the ICNext question
How you'll be graded

100 points, 60% to pass.

  • root cause25
  • recommendation20
  • problem structuring25
  • quantitative analysis30
Hint
Reveal suggested structure

Stage capacities; theory of constraints; value of relieving the bottleneck; re-check the next constraint