Mathematics Applied To Industry’s Benefit

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28896, 16 May 1959, Page 6

Mathematics Applied To Industry’s Benefit

(Neto Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, May 15. There’s money in mathematics . . . not just for the mathematician but for the manufacturer, the bus operator, the airline and the businessman. Mathematics, if properly applied in a scientific manner, can mean greater efficiency, increased output bigger profits. For two or three years, the D.S.I.R. has been looking to see how it can give more aid to industry and business in New Zealand. It is ready to go ahead now —if industry and business are willing to co-operate. In the jargon of science, the department is ready to apply “operational research” to industry and business.

Briefly, operational research is the application of scientific techniques to management research problems for the purpose of providing executives with a more quantitative and factual basis for making decisions. A more detailed meaning of operational research, its application to business and industry, and its proven success was given in four papers read to a special conference arranged by the Wellington division of the Institute of Management at the Wellington Technical College today. The four speakers were Mr I. D. Dick, assistant secretary of the D.5.1.R.; Dr. R. M. Williams, director of the department’s applied mathematics laboratory; Dr. H. R. Thompson, senior principal scientific officer of the department in Auckland; and Mr K. Seal, chief chemist of the Amalgamated Brick and Pipe Company, Ltd., Auckland. Here are some of their facts and views:

Mr Dick discussed the possibilities of inter-firm productivity analysis resulting in an assessment of the overall position of each firm in a similar industry in relation to the others, pin-point-ing weak spots and evaluating their importance. It is then up to the individual firms to take action.

No firm is given information on other firms. All that one knows is its relative positionsuch as below average, or that it is in the top third and so on. France, particularly, has had considerable success from this type of analysis over the last 10 years in spite of the difficulty of getting the idea across in the early stages. Mr Williams dealt. with the “queueing theory”—jargon derived from the idea of customers arriving at a counter to be served. Its application has been found in a number of fields, including the problem of organising production processes, maintenance work on machines (where the machines are the customers

in the queue and the maintenance staff are the servers), the arrival of aircraft over an airport, road traffic and so on. Effective work has been done as a result of this theory by the statistical and operational research groups of the London Transport Authority—answering such questions as “what factors influence the speed of loading of buses?” , By testing statistical* designs ox various types of lubricating oils, the authority reduced its fuel bill by £500.000 out of a normal bill of £6 million. Tasman Empire Airways was cited by Dr. Thompson as an organisation which has enlisted the aid of operational research to help to overcome the problem ox high cancellation rates and loss of revenue. The firm has now adopted a deliberate policy o permitting controlled overbooKings, relying on subsequent cancellations to keep the numotf o bookings at departure time just below, the seating accommodation of the plane. Fifty representatives of from as far away as Auckiana* New Plymouth and Chnsx church attended today’s conference. A number of departments Labour, wor». Transport—sent representatives. There was even a representauvo of the Totalisator Agency Board. No representative of the we lington City Council transport department attended the conxe [Earlier this week the Welling* ton City Council was told tnaj the city transport department na incurred a loss of the year ending March 31 ia h against a loss of £172,000 for * preceding year. The council apj proved fare increases designed earn another £120,000.1