Quality, Warranty and Preventive Maintenance examines the impact of product quality on warranty and maintenance costs and strategies, from the perspectives of both manufacturers and users. In addition, the theories of warranty and preventive maintenance are introduced and discussed. Common wisdom supports the notion that better product quality means lower warranty costs for the manufacturer, and lower maintenance costs for the users of a manufactured product. This proposition is examined in some detail on the basis of failure time models. The authors investigate what exactly better quality means in warranty and maintenance management, and how it impacts warranty policies and costs for the manufacturer, and replacement and maintenance strategies and costs for the users. In measuring quality improvement, the main concepts and tools used are those of stochastic ordering and mixture models. The theoretical base of the work is a time-varying failure-rectification process. This process includes, as special cases, replacement, minimal repair, and imperfect repair, as alternative rectification modes that may be available to the manufacturer or the user in warranty-servicing or maintaining a product. In addition to serving as a unifying base for the entire monograph, the use of this process enables one to investigate jointly optimal repair-effort/warranty-policy and repair-effort/maintenance-strategy configurations for repairable units. This book should be of interest to researchers in industry and academia, and to quality, warranty and maintenance professionals, specialists, and managers with a technical background. It is suitable as a textbook to support graduate-level seminar courses in OR/MS, IE and business administration curricula.

The exponential increase in the development of technology coupled with the customers’ immense desire to possess the newest technological products makes for truncated product lifespans, which instigates a substantial upsurge in their rate of disposal. Attempts have been made to establish specialized product recovery facilities with the intention of diminishing the volume of accumulated waste delivered to landfills using product recovery procedure such as remanufacturing. The economic benefits produced by remanufacturing also portray the role of product recovery in a more attractive light. The quality of a remanufactured product is uncertain for some consumers. Therefore, these consumers possess insecurities in deciding whether or not the remanufactured products will render the same expected performance. This ambiguity regarding a remanufactured product could possibly result in the consumer deciding against its purchase. With such consumer apprehension, remanufacturers often seek market mechanisms that provide reassurance as to the stable durability that these products still maintain. One strategy that the remanufacturers often use is the utilization of the premise of offering product warranties with preventive maintenance on their products. This book is concerned with the practice and theory of warranty management and preventive maintenance, particularly in relation to remanufactured products’ warranties. Models developed in this book can be used for making the right decisions in offering renewable, nonrenewable, one and two dimensional warranty policies, and for managerial decision in considering maintenance contracts or outsourcing maintenance for remanufactured components and products. Features Discusses a variety of warranty policies and preventive maintenance of remanufactured products (first book to do so) Presents mathematical models and applications for warranty policies using examples and simulation results Considers cost and optimization problems from the remanufacturer's and buyer's points of views Provides a foundation for academicians interested in building models in the area of warranty and preventive maintenance analysis of remanufactured products Offers the essential methodology needed by practitioners involved with warranty and preventive maintenance analysis, along with extensive references for further research

This book discusses action-oriented, concise and easy-to-communicate goals and challenges related to quality, reliability, infocomm technology and business operations. It brings together groundbreaking research in the area of software reliability, e-maintenance and big data analytics, highlighting the importance of maintaining the current growth in information technology (IT) adoption in businesses, while at the same time proposing process innovations to ensure sustainable development in the immediate future. In its thirty-seven chapters, it covers various areas of e-maintenance solutions, software architectures, patching problems in software reliability, preventive maintenance, industrial big data and reliability applications in electric power systems. The book reviews the ways in which countries currently attempt to resolve the conflicts and opportunities related to quality, reliability, IT and business operations, and proposes that internationally coordinated research plans are essential for effective and sustainable development, with research being most effective when it uses evidence-based decision-making frameworks resulting in clear management objectives, and is organized within adaptive management frameworks. Written by leading experts, the book is of interest to researchers, academicians, practitioners and policy makers alike who are working towards the common goal of making business operations more effective and sustainable.

This utterly comprehensive work is thought to be the first to integrate the literature on the physics of the failure of complex systems such as hospitals, banks and transport networks. It has chapters on particular aspects of maintenance written by internationally-renowned researchers and practitioners. This book will interest maintenance engineers and managers in industry as well as researchers and graduate students in maintenance, industrial engineering and applied mathematics.

Warranty Data Collection and Analysis deals with warranty data collection and analysis and the problems associated with these activities. The book is a both a research monograph and a handbook for practitioners. As a research monograph, it unifies the literature on warranty data collection and analysis, and presents the important results in an integrated manner. In the process, it highlights topics that require further research. As a handbook, it provides the essential methodology needed by practitioners involved with warranty data collection and analysis, along with extensive references to further results. Models and techniques needed for proper and effective analysis of data are included, together with guidelines for their use in warranty management, product improvement, and new product development. Warranty Data Collection and Analysis will be of interest to researchers (engineers and statisticians) and practitioners (engineers, applied statisticians, and managers) involved with product warranty and reliability. It is also suitable for use as a reference text for graduate-level reliability programs in engineering, applied statistics, operations research, and management.

An effective reliability programme is an essential component of every product's design, testing and efficient production. From the failure analysis of a microelectronic device to software fault tolerance and from the accelerated life testing of mechanical components to hardware verification, a common underlying philosophy of reliability applies. Defining both fundamental and applied work across the entire systems reliability arena, this state-of-the-art reference presents methodologies for quality, maintainability and dependability. Featuring: Contributions from 60 leading reliability experts in academia and industry giving comprehensive and authoritative coverage. A distinguished international Editorial Board ensuring clarity and precision throughout. Extensive references to the theoretical foundations, recent research and future directions described in each chapter. Comprehensive subject index providing maximum utility to the reader. Applications and examples across all branches of engineering including IT, power, automotive and aerospace sectors. The handbook's cross-disciplinary scope will ensure that it serves as an indispensable tool for researchers in industrial, electrical, electronics, computer, civil, mechanical and systems engineering. It will also aid professional engineers to find creative reliability solutions and management to evaluate systems reliability and to improve processes. For student research projects it will be the ideal starting point whether addressing basic questions in communications and electronics or learning advanced applications in micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS), manufacturing and high-assurance engineering systems.

Volume 19 of Applications of Management Science focuses on the application of management science methodologies, data envelopment analysis and multi-criteria decision making.