ABSTRACT
Major industries in Third World countries have an organizational form that very closely follows a traditional Western pattern of organizing and managing industrial production. The formal resemblance between a Third World industry and the traditional Western production models has therefore brought about an illusionary expectation that the computer systems should be particularly applicable in those industries. In Western production models, the core of the materials control problem is commonly described as a cost optimization problem whereas external conditions (suppliers, transport) seldom present any major hindrance to fulfilling work orders or purchase order quantities. Industrial production has a general built-in planning problem due to the uncertainty in predicting both market demand and availability of materials. The chapter presents the design of such a computerized system which will serve as a representative for similar systems. The system is IBM's Communication Oriented Production Information Control System.
