A	B	C	D
Number of boards requested	2500	2300	1800	1400
price	$38	$42	$45	$50
variable cost per board	23	25	27	30
fixed cost per board	9	10	10	15
number of machine minutes per board	3	4	5	6

JLE Electronics is an independent contract manufacturer of complex printed circuit board assemblies. Computer companies and other electronics firms engage JLE to assemble their boards. Utilizing computer controlled manufacturing and test machinery and equipment, JLE provides manufacturing services employing surface mount technology (SMT) and pin-through-hole (PTH) interconnection technologies. The customer purchases the subcomponents and pays JLE a per board fee to assemble the components.

JLE has a new one of kind, state of the art board assembly line. The line can operate 20 hours per day, seven days per week, in each three week (21-day) period. Four customers have asked that their boards be manufactured on this line over the next three-week period. The table above summarizes the number of units of each board requested, the price JLE will charge for each board, JLE's variable and fixed cost per board, and the number of assembly line minutes each board requires. Fixed cost per board is the allocated cost of property taxes, fire insurance, accounting, depreciation, and so forth.

Make the following assumptions:

The four customer orders can be produced only on the new JLE line.

If JLE rejects an order, future orders from that customer are not affected.

There are on set up or down time between orders.

Customers are willing to have any number of boards produced by JLE up to the number of units specified above. For example, customer A has requested 2,500 boards in the 21-day period, but would accept a smaller number.

The four customers comprise the entire set of potential customers who would want to use the new JLE line in the next 21-day period.

Required:

1. Compute the total capacity in minutes

2. Compute the contribution margin per unit of the constraint and determine the production sequence.

3. Based on your production sequence, create the production schedule.

4. Given your production schedule, complete a contribution margin income statement. (Hint: make sure you capture ALL of the fixed expenses - careful!!)

5. If demand is expected to remain strong, what ideas or suggestions would you give to JLE's management so they could satisfy more of the unfulfilled customer orders?