Dear Olympus...... Don't You Want To Sell Any OMD's ?

Forecasts of manufactured goods become really accurate - WAY too late to change supply on time. These days, with the long supply chains and global sourcing, it takes quite a while to adjust supply to demand. And if you think this is just Oly doing poor forecasting, no, it's ALL forecasting at the point when decisions have to be made, months in advance. A widely cited study found that in electronics goods, the accuracy was plus or minus 5% at one month, plus or minus 20% at two months, and plus or minus 50% at three months; earlier than that "toss a coin":

http://imamu.edu.sa/Scientific_selections/Documents/IT/Leagility-%20Integrating%20the%20lean%20and%20agile%20manufacturing%20paradigms%20in%20the%20total%20supply%20chain.pdf

Moreover, the forecasting problem is exacerbated by the so-called "bullwhip effect": http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/2634565?uid=3739976&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=56223372113
--
W Alex Stewart