1.

Billu Barber Billu Barber, a high end salon targeted at the film and TV stars, has been recently started at Band Stand, Bandra by Irfan and SRK. At the salon, the hair cut as requested by the customers on an average takes 30 minutes. There are four hair stylists, each with a salary of Rs 300/hour, delivering the hair cut. The average number of potential customers arriving for a hair cut is 6 film stars per hour and 14 TV stars per hour. The inter-arrival times are assumed to be exponentially distributed. Customers are high end customers and just cannot wait at all as there are several other well-known salons such as Sallu Hair Weaving Salon, Ghajini Hair Styles, and Piggy Chops etc. in the vicinity. (A) Irfan and SRK would like to know: 1. On an average, how many customers per hour their salon is losing to its competitors? 2. On an average, how many customers are there in the salon? 3. On an average, how much time a customer spends in the salon? (B) SRK knows a lot about the entertainment and the business. He has a brilliant idea: He has hired an entertainment team (comprising of Juhi, Lara, and Deepika) which will entertain the waiting customers. Customers will be served on the first come first served basis and will be immediately taken for a hair cut once any of the hair stylists becomes available. He has also offered a discount of Rs. 10 per every minute of wait. He is now 100% confident that all the potential customers will get the hair cut in his salon as they can enjoy the show during the waiting period and will get the discount as well. He also plans to increase the number of hair stylists (with a similar wages as mentioned earlier) to manage the increased demand. 1. How many hair stylists he should hire? 2. The number of air-conditioners to be installed in the salon is directly proportional to the parameter of average number of people present inside the salon at any time. Determine this parameter value. 3. Determine the average time spent by a customer inside the salon. (C) Irfan thinks that the discount offer of Rs. 10 per minute of wait is ridiculous as high end customers, especially the Film stars, hardly bother about this. He argues that they should get a priority because their time is more valuable than the TV stars. Does this argument make sense? If yes, how? If not, why? 2. Mumbai Port Trust (MbPT) MbPT has engaged you as a consultant to advise it on possible changes in the handling of wheat exports. At present, a crew of dockworkers using conventional belt conveyors unload hopper car containing wheat into cargo ships bound overseas. The crew is known to take an average of 30 minutes to unload a car. The crew is paid a total wage of Rs. 2000/hr. Hopper car arrivals have averaged 12 per 8-hour shift. MbPT has to pay Indian Railways a demurrage charge from time of arrival to release at a rate of Rs. 600/hr on hopper cars. Partially unloaded cars from one shift are first in line for the following shift. Because of excessive demurrage charges, adding another work crew has been proposed. A visit to the work area indicates that both crews will be unable to work together on the same car because of congestion; however, two cars may be unloaded simultaneously with one crew per car. During your deliberations, the industrial engineering staff reports that a pneumatic handling system, costing Rs. 1.6 crores, is available in the market. This system can transfer wheat from cars to cargo ships at a constant rate of three cars per hour, 24 hours per day, with the assistance of a skilled operator earning Rs. 600/hr. The port uses a 10% discount rate for capital improvement projects. The port is in operation 24 hours per day, 365 days a year. For this analysis, assume a 10-year planning horizon, and prepare a recommendation for MbPT.