Material requirements planning system infusion

There is increasing pressure upon manufacturing firms to make their processes more efficient and effective. An important factor for improving these manufacturing processes is production and inventory management, and a variety of production and inventory management information systems such as Material Requirements Planning (MRP) have thus been developed. However, MRP has a significant history of implementation problems. To help explain why these problems occur, this paper examines factors affecting MRP implementation from a innovation diffusion perspective. Within this perspective, the effect of manufacturing tasks and MRP technology on the infusion of MRP are examined. Data are gatherered via longitudinal telephone survey of US manufacturing firms to determine these effects. A logistical regression analysis of the data indicates that factors such as production complexity which affect MRP adoption can work in an opposite direction for MRP infusion (the use of MRP to its “fullest potential”). This implies that it may be advantageous for some firms to adopt and maintain MRP at low infusion levels rather than attempting to increase infusion over time. These results help explain some of the problems currently associated with MRP implementation and help point out potential problem areas for those contemplating MRP implementation.