About.com

Buying Group Shows Quick Return

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 02:58:46 +0000

Proof that shared buying groups can save significant sums for the members of the group can be found in London, where the National Health Service (NHS) North Central London Procurement Co-operative has reported saving £2.7 million ($4.25 million) in six months.

The co-operative is made up of five primary care trusts in the London Boroughs of Barnet, Camden, Enfield, Haringey, and Islington. The buying group implemented an e-Procurement application from Unit4 and implemented a number of policies including paperless processes, greater access to spend data and best pricing information from vendors. The buying group reports that the Unit4 procurement software captures almost ninety percent of purchases made by the health authorities, which allows requisitioner to gain the lowest current price from the vendor.

Follow me on Twitter

Aircraft Manufacturing Declines

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 22:42:26 +0000

Aircraft manufacturing in the US has declined in 2011 based on figures from the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA). In 2010 US manufacturers delivered 1,932 aircraft, while in 2011 that number had fallen in 1,865, a decline of 3.5 percent. The revenue from those sales actually increased less than half a percent in 2011 from $19 billion to $19.1 billion.

When the total figures are broken down, the business jet market fell by 6.3 percent, turboprop deliveries fell by 2.4 percent, and piston driven aircraft deliveries fell only 1.5 percent.

Aircraft manufacturers are concerned about the President's proposal to levy a $100-per-flight user fee tax for business jets. The proposal is estimated to generate $7.4 billion over 10 years, but does exclude piston aircraft, public aircraft, and air ambulances.

Follow me on Twitter

System Picks 141,000 Items Per Day

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 02:58:32 +0000

Warehouses can be found in any business and medical facilities where the timely distribution of goods can be a life saver. The Children's Hospital Colorado in Aurora is a 298 bed facility that relies heavily on the materials management department that picks and delivers over 141,000 items per day. The department has to ensure that the items are picked and delivered to the correct location on time.

To achieve this impressive feat the materials management department has three 52 foot horizontal carousels from Kardex Remstar as well as pick to light technology. The carousels take up 1,690 square feet and are operated with one order picker. The items from the carousels replenish 147 automated supply cabinets located on the patient floors. The facilities Peoplesoft system checks the inventory of the supply cabinets several times a day and sends a pick order to the carousels to replenish stock if necessary.

Follow me on Twitter

Packaging Blamed For Latest Recall

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 12:22:05 +0000

The latest recall of Tylenol by Johnson and Johnson (J&J) has now been blamed on the packaging of the infant medicine not the active ingredient itself. The issue was that some parents had problems with the design of the bottles which were introduced by J&J to make the measuring of dosing easier. However it appears that the opposite was true. Parents complained that a protective cover on the top of the bottles did not work correctly. The design was that it was able to limit how much of the medicine could be drawn into a plastic syringe. But when the plastic syringe was inserted, it pushed the protective cover into the bottle.

J&J had expected that the new design could become an industry standard for dosing, but the recall has put that very much into question. J&J will be recalling over 574,000 bottles of the infant Tylenol. This latest recall means that J&J have needed 25 recalls since December of 2009.

Follow me on Twitter

Billion Dollar ERP System May Yet Be Completed

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 02:58:28 +0000

The Air Forces' Expeditionary Combat Support System (ECSS) system based on the Oracle ERP platform is continuing to stumble along, but hopes of getting the project back on track are in the works. The $1 billion dollar systems replacement project was started back in 2007 and was expected to be completed by 2013. But the project delays blamed on the system integrator, Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC), forced the Air Force to estimate the completion to be beyond 2017.

With the on-going problems with the ECSS project, the Air Force stopped work on the final phase of the project last September. This led to CSC removing 165 consultants from the project; laying off 114 employees in Ohio. But now an Air Force spokeswoman wrote in an email response to questions from the Dayton Daily News that there will be an announcement in May concerning the restructuring of the ECSS project and getting it back on track. This will include a new estimate of the total cost for completion and hopefully a revised end date.

Read more about Oracle ERP here.

Follow me on Twitter

Pringles Sold for $2.7 Billion

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 02:58:19 +0000

Over the last few years Proctor and Gamble (P&G) has been divesting of most all of its food-related businesses and retaining its existing higher margin business such as beauty and personal care products. This week P&G sold its Pringles brand to Kelloggs for a reported $2.7 billion, which includes two manufacturing sites in Jackson, Tennessee and Mechelen in Belgium.

The Pringles brand has become a billion dollar enterprise for P&G due to extremely efficient manufacturing and supply chain operations. P&G had planned to sell the brand to Diamond Foods, but an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) into Diamond derailed the deal. The investigation is looking at payments of $20 million in August 2010 and $60 million in September 2011 to walnut growers who supply the company. The payments were proper, but the issue is which fiscal year they should have been accounted for as an expense.

Follow me on Twitter

Counterfeit Cancer Drugs In US

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 02:58:23 +0000

This week we have seen the shortages of cancer fighting drugs caused by manufacturing shutdowns and lack of profitability, but today there is a report that counterfeit cancer drugs have been found in the pharmaceutical supply chain in the US. Some batches of the drug Avastin, which is an approved treatment for certain types of colon, lung, kidney and brain cancer, has been reported to be counterfeit by an unknown number of facilities in the US. The drug's Swiss manufacturer, Roche, believes the counterfeit batches were imported into the US, but has not released any other information relating to where or when this may have occurred.

In 2010 Avastin generated $6.3 billion in revenue for Roche and is 14th best-selling drug in the USA. The cost of the drug has been criticized in the US and Europe. Many insurance companies will not pay for some or all of the cost of treatment with Avastin as it is reported to cost up to $100,000 per year per patient. Nationalized health systems in the UK and Canada will generally not pay for treatment using Avastin. In 2011 the UK denied approval for Avastin to be used for breast cancer and in November the FDA rescinded approval for the drug to be used for breast cancer in the US stating that it did not help patients live longer or improve quality of life.

Follow me on Twitter

FDA Reports Cancer Drugs In Serious Short Supply

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 02:58:44 +0000

Will drug manufacturers become as despised as lawyers and cars salesmen? The general public is reading story after story of children being denied life-saving cancer medication due manufacturers hating or slowing production due to quality issues or the simple fact that they can't make any money on the drugs they produce. The latest high profile case concerns the cancer drug methotrexate, which used in the treatment of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), which affects children between two and five.

In November Ben Venue Laboratories stopped production due to concerns around quality prompted by the FDA. But the other manufacturers of methotrxate have not produced enough of the drug to cover the shortages caused by the Ben Venue shutdown. According to the FDA, APP has stopped manufacturing 2ml vials, Mylan only has product for emergency orders, Sandoz has temporarily discontinued 2ml vials, and Hospira is experiencing back orders.

Do companies have the right to stop manufacture of life-saving drugs if their production costs exceed the price they can sell the product for? Should the FDA or the government step in, or will the manufacturers bow to public pressure?

Follow me on Twitter

Freight Movements Reach New Highs

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 02:58:22 +0000

December 2011 was a great month for freight carriers and transportation companies. Figures form the U.S. Department of Transportation's Bureau of Transportation Statistics' (BTS) found that freight shipments, measured by the Freight Transportation Services Index (TSI), increased by the largest amount in 17 years. The Freight TSI measures the month-to-month changes in freight shipments by mode of transportation in ton-miles. In December the index was 113.7 which is the highest since the index started in 1990.

The index was at an all time low in April 2009 when it stood at 94.3. Since then the number of freight shipments has increased in 22 out of the last 32 months. For the full year 2011, freight shipments were up 6.4 percent, which is the best growth rate since 2002.

Follow me on Twitter

USPS Reports Billion Dollar Losses

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 02:58:17 +0000

Since 2009 the United States Postal Service (USPS) has lost $20.7 billion. Currently this trend shows no sign of reversing, as the agency announced a loss of $3.3 billion in the three months ending in December 2011. The USPS did acknowledge that the holiday season of 2011 was busier with an increase of seven percent in the package business, but other areas saw continued decreases, which overshadowed any increase in the package business.

The USPS does have plans to reduce annual costs by $20 billion by 2015, which includes reducing the number of post offices by 12 percent, reducing the number of mail processing facilities, and eliminating approximately 220,000 career positions by 2015.

Last year the Postal Service reached its $15 billion borrowing limit from the U.S. Treasury and has forecast a record $14.1 billion loss for the 2012 fiscal year.

Follow me on Twitter