'Interactive Session\r'

'Interactive academic term 1 INTERACTIVE SESSION: TECHNOLOGY UPS COMPETES ball-shapedly WITH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY join Parcel process (UPS), is the worlds largest air and ground mailboat-distribution company. It started out in 1907 in a closet-sized basement office. Jim Casey and Claude Ryanâ€two teenagers from Seattle with two bicycles and unrivaled ph one(a)â€promised the â€Å"best service and lowest rates. ” UPS has employ this formula successfully for more than 90 years. at once UPS delivers more than 14. 1 million parcels and documents for from each one one day in the United States and more than 200 an otherwise(prenominal) countries and territories.The firm has been able to maintain leadership in small-package tar services despite stiff competition from FedEx and Airborne Express by investing intemperately in advanced info technology. During the past decade, UPS has poured billions of dollars into technology and systems to boost customer service wh ile retentiveness costs low and streamlining its overall operations. Using a handheld computer called a Delivery nurture Acquisition Device (DIAD), a UPS driver butt end automatically capture customers signatures along with pickup, delivery, and timecard tuition.The driver therefore places the DIAD into the UPS trucks vehicle adapter, an information-transmitting device that is connected to the cellular environ network. Package tracking information is whence communicate to UPSs computer network for storage and processing by UPSs main computers in Mahwah, New Jersey, and Alph atomic number 18tta, Georgia. From there, the information bottom be accessed worldwide to provide proof of delivery to customers or to resolve to customer queries. Through its change package tracking system, UPS enkindle monitor packages passim the delivery process.At various points along the route from transmitter to receiver, bar code devices scan shipping information on the package label; the inf ormation is then fed into the primeval computer. Customer service representatives can check the status of any package from ground computers linked to the central computers and are able to respond immediately to inquiries from customers. UPS customers can also access this information from the companys electronic network order using their bear computers or wireless devices, such as pagers and cell phones. Anyone with a package to hip can access the UPS Web site to track packages, check delivery routes, weigh shipping rates, determine time in transit, and order of business a pickup. Businesses can use the Web site to arrange UPS shipments and bill the shipments to the companys UPS account number or to a credit card. The data collected at the UPS Web site are transmitted to the UPS central computer and then back to the customer by and by processing. UPS also provides tools that enable customers, such Cisco Systems, to enter UPS functions, such as tracking and cost calculations, into their own Web sites so that they can track shipments without visit the UPS site.Information technology has helped UPS reinvent itself and keep growing. UPS implemented a suite of custom-built software that uses operations seek and mapping technology to optimize the way packages are loaded and delivered. Because UPS delivers 14 million small packages each day, the resulting information is cutting the distance that delivery trucks prompt by more than 100 million miles each year. UPS is now leveraging its decades of expertise managing its own global delivery network to oversee logistics and supply-chain management for other companies.It created a UPS Supply Chain Solutions division that provides a complete bundle of standardized services to 1 subscribing companies at a fraction of what it would cost to fig their own systems and infrastructure. These services include supply-chain design and management, payload forwarding, customs brokerage, mail services, multimodal transport ation, and financial services, in accession to logistics services. Adidas America, based in Portland, Oregon, is one of many companies benefiting from these services. each three months the company introduces as many as 10,000 new apparel items and 4,000 new footwear items.It mustiness handle orders for many thousands of retailers for these orders, and many of these orders are anteriority requests that must be fulfilled within one or two days. UPS Supply Chain Solutions unite what was previously handled by multiple third-party logistics providers into a undivided streamlined network outfitted with automated farm animal and order fulfillment systems. By having UPS coordinate and manage distribution, Adidas America increased its order accuracy rate, boosted on-time deliveries, and alter customer service,Sources: â€Å"Adidas Goes for the Gold in Customer Service,” www. ups. com, accessed June 14, 2006; United Parcel Service, Round UPS, Winter 2006; and Dave Barnes, †Å"Delivering Corporate Citizenship,” Optimize, folk 2005. CASE STUDY QUESTIONS 1. 2. 3. What are the inputs, processing, and outputs of UPS’s package tracking system? What technologies are used by UPS? How are these technologies related to UPSs business strategy? What problems do UPSs information systems solve. What would happen if these systems were not available? 2\r\n'