Strategic Cost Management Sem 3 Solved Assignments

Description

Strategic Cost Management Sem 3 NMIMS Solved Assignments

Last Data 28 Oct

Assignment Marks: 20

Q1 Bharat Electronics, a diversified manufacturer, traditionally used direct labour hours to allocate overheads across its wide range of products. However, recent profitability analyses revealed that high-volume products were consistently over-costed, while low-volume, customised products appeared uncompetitive due to under-costing. The CFO believes these cost distortions have led to suboptimal pricing strategies and poor resource allocation. In response, the company wants to shift to activity-based costing (ABC) by identifying core activities such as machine setups, product inspections, and material handling, and establishing appropriate cost drivers.How should Bharat Electronics apply the ABC model to improve accuracy in product costing and pricing decisions? Describe how activity identification, cost driver selection, and cost allocation would address the identified distortions and support better managerial decision-making.

(10 Marks)

Q2 (A) Abhi Limited, an established consumer electronics manufacturer, struggled with inaccurately allocated overhead costs under traditional costing, leading to weak competitive performance. Facing rivals with lower prices and superior cost structures, the company adopted activity-based costing (ABC), life cycle costing (LCC), and strengthened internal value chain linkages across departments such as procurement, production, and marketing. These initiatives improved their cost allocation, supported product innovation, and helped regain market standing, but required significant investment and cultural adaptation.Evaluate how Abhi Limited’s adoption of ABC, LCC, and internal value chain linkages transformed its cost management and competitive position. Critique the strengths and potential pitfalls of this integrated approach, and justify whether such strategic costing methods are sustainable in rapidly evolving markets.

(5 Marks)

Q2 (B) A manufacturing firm analyses two alternative sales strategies using CVP analysis. For Strategy X, a fixed cost of Rs.4,00,000 is incurred, with a variable cost of Rs.110 per unit and a selling price of Rs.200 per unit. If the firm switches to Strategy Y, the

fixed cost rises by 25%, but the variable cost per unit drops by 10%. However, market research indicates that for every Rs.10 decrease in variable cost, the sales price must be reduced by Rs.6 to maintain demand volume. Compute (a) the break-even quantity under Strategy Y, and (b) the sales quantity at which both strategies yield the same profit.

(5 Marks)

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Instructions

• All Questions carry equal marks
• All Questions are compulsory
• All answers to be explained in not more than 1000 words for question Q1 and for question Q2(A) and Q2(B) in not more than 500 words for each subsection. Use relevant examples,illustrations as far as possible
• All answers to be written individually. Discussion and group work is not advisable.
• Students are free to refer to any books/reference material/website/internet for attempting their assignments, but are not allowed to copy the matter as it is from the source of reference.
• Students should write the assignment in their own words. Copying of assignments from other students is not allowed
• Students should follow the following parameter for answering the assignment questions