Predicting order lead times

Entering on market, companies confront with different problems. But the largest problems of today's time are too long lead times of orders. A client that wants a particular product to be made will select the best bidder considering on delivery time. To make a bid just on the basis of experience of employees is very risky nowadays. Therefore we propose a procedure by which - on the basis of actual lead times of orders processed in the company's workplaces in the past - expected lead times of planned (and indirectly - production) orders can be predicted. The result of the proposed procedure is an empirical distribution of possible lead times for the new order, and on the basis of this distribution it is possible to predict the most probable lead time of a new order. Using the proposed procedure, the sales department can make a prediction for the customer about delivery time of the planned order. As an illustration of the procedure for predicting lead times of orders, a case study is presented: lead time of order for the for manufacturing the filter housing was predicted; the tool is manufactured in the Slovenian company ETI Ltd.