Planning mechanism

Sales planning has to reflect the bidding process presented in subchapter 2.3. Fig. 20 illustrates the paradigm shift from demand fulfilment towards sales plan achievement, where demand forecast captures the role of a price-quantity bid that is cleared based on available supply and a certain sales flexibility. The sales planning mechanism is further described in the following detailed requirements. 

ES-EPA (Expert System for Environmental Pollutant Analysis) is an expert system for producing laboratory test plans, including the appropriate sampling methods, pretreatments, test methods and their order. ES-EPA generates test plans in a stepwise manner from abstract plans called "templates" to detailed plans, using a hierarchical planning mechanism. The knowledge base contains information on analysis items, test methods, test equipment, pretreatments and other necessary information. The prototype system has been successfully tested for various cases in the domain. The development of a delivery version has been completed and it will soon be used in the field on a daily basis to further verify its feasibility. 

In order to have multiple representations of a plan with different abstraction levels, a hierarchical planning mechanism is necessary. The method is first to sketch a plan that is complete but vague and then gradually refine the vague parts into more detailed sub-plans until the plan consists of a complete sequence of detailed components (Z) ... 

A simplified schematic of the hierarchical planning mechanism of ES-EPA is shown in Figure 2. There are four representations of a plan with different abstraction levels Level 1, 2, 3 and 4. In this figure, the rectangular boxes represent specific tasks that can not be expanded any further, and boxes with rounded corners represent abstract components. 

On Level 4, all the abstract components are expanded into specific task components. The hierarchical planning mechanism stops on this level. Then rules for detailed modification are applied to the plan. Certain components might be added or deleted after the application of these rules. 

The prototype of ES-EPA was tested by human experts for various cases in a limited domain, and most of generated test plans proved to be practical. The hierarchical template planning mechanism was proved to be suitable for representing the knowledge of the human experts and also extremely efficient. The system can generate a complex plan consisting of more than 100 components in one minute on a Symbolics 3650 machine, which is substantially faster than the human experts. 

VI. Theoretical planning, mechanism, valences, electronic and geometric factors... 

Under the traditional adversarial relationship the vehicle manufacturer would seek to reduce the material cost by squeezing the profit margin of the component suppliers. The co-makership approach is quite different - here the vehicle manufacturer seeks instead to reduce a supplier s costs, not their profits. Through collaboration and closely integrated logistics planning mechanisms the two parties... 

Figure 7.6 Planned mechanism for skin delivery of ethosomal systems.

---