University Project: Project Network for New Laptop Computer (ACC8105)

This project analyzes the network for designing, manufacturing, and marketing a new laptop computer. The assignment begins with the creation of an Activity on Node (AON) diagram, identifying the critical path and calculating the project's scheduled duration. It then addresses project network management, including strategies to expedite the project launch, considering time and cost trade-offs. The analysis includes project crashing estimations, identifying specific activities for reduction and calculating the impact on the overall project duration. The student utilizes provided data on activity durations, costs, and crash estimations to make informed decisions about project acceleration. The report also includes considerations of management decisions and potential incentive structures. The project also identifies the critical activities for the project, and evaluates the lowest improvement factor for each activity. The final analysis includes the crashing of specific activities to reduce the overall project duration.

Project Network for a New Laptop
Computer
Name of the Student
Name of the University

The AON Diagram
(Figure 1: The AON Diagram for the Project)
(Source: Created by author)

Identification of Critical Path
 The red highlighted sections from Figure 1 are
identified as critical path activities within the project
 Scheduled duration of the project is calculated as:
= Sum of the total tasks in the critical path
= (90 + 25 + 14+ 20 + 45) days
= 194 days

Information on Project Network
 Management would need to complete the project 5
days prior than the scheduled period
 Crashing of the critical activities needs to be done
within 5 days

Information on Project Network
The critical activities are being listed in the following table:
Critical
Path
Length
Of
Critical
Path
Earliest
Start
Earliest
Finish
Latest
Start
Latest
Finish
A 90 0 90 0 90
F 25 90 115 90 115
G 14 115 129 115 129
D 20 129 149 129 149
J 45 149 194 149 194

Consideration of Management
Decisions
 Management needs the product launch 5 days prior
than the scheduled time
 An incentive structure has been planned accordingly
 Primary reason is competition with their global
competitor

The Project Crash Estimations
Activit
y
Normal
Time
(days)
Normal
Cost
Crash
time
(days)
Crash
Cost
Improvemen
t Factor
A 90 $2,250 85 $2,520 54
B 15 $180 13 $210 15
C 5 $90 4 $120 30
D 20 $300 19 $330 30
E 21 $231 17 $315 21
F 25 $250 21 $382 33
G 14 $70 12 $112 21
H 28 $390 25 $450 20
I 30 $510 28 $570 30
J 45 $1,350 41 $1,530 45

The Project Crash Estimations
 The highlighted red activities are defined as critical
activities for the project
 The critical activities for the project are: A, F, G, D and J
 Lowest improvement factor is for activity G
 Next lowest improvement factor is for activity D
 Further lowest improvement factor is for activity F

The Project Crash Estimations
 Total reduction in the project duration is 7 days
 Duration of critical path after crashing is: 90 + 21 +
12 + 19 + 45 = 187 days
 Specific activities that needs to be crashed are: G, D
and F
 Capabilities of investment should help in deciding
over the early release of product

Bibliography
Ahipasaoglu, S.D., Natarajan, K. and Shi, D., 2019. Distributionally
robust project crashing with partial or no correlation
information. Networks, 74(1), pp.79-106.
Arora, P.K. and Bhatia, R., 2018. Agent-based regression test case
generation using class diagram, use cases and activity
diagram. Procedia Computer Science, 125, pp.747-753.
Ballesteros-Perez, P., Elamrousy, K.M. and González-Cruz, M.C.,
2019. Non-linear time-cost trade-off models of activity crashing:
Application to construction scheduling and project compression with
fast-tracking. Automation in Construction, 97, pp.229-240.
Mahmoudi, A. and Feylizadeh, M.R., 2018. A grey mathematical
model for crashing of projects by considering time, cost, quality, risk
and law of diminishing returns. Grey Systems: Theory and
Application.

Thank You