Study title

Company profile, product structure, use of technology in the company, qualification, personnel structure, production structure, work organization in production among small and medium-sized companies in business in the area of mechanical engineering. Topics: company profile: type of company; number of production locations; proportion of tensile processing in product manufacture; manufacture in the company and out-sourced processes in production; previous and expected turnover development, personnel development, profit development and development of demand; judgement on uniqueness of organization of the departments in the company and written documentation of rules within the company; judgement on the distribution of leadership tasks to various employees and different levels; judgement on the current profit situation of the company and the economic situation of mechanical engineering over-all; current order backlog; volume of turnover 1997; percentage of finished product groups based on individual orders, framework orders as well as without specific order; changes in responsibility of individual company areas in the last three years; areas of cooperation with other enterprises. Customer and supplier relations: rank order of competitive strategy for current and new markets; total number of customers of the company in the last year; number of steady customers and their proportion of over-all turnover; customer structure and their proportion of turnover; dependence of the company on a few large customers with long-term supply relations; further processing of delivered products by the customers and by the company; delivery at regular time intervals; possibility for customers and company to change the composition of the delivery on short notice; responsibility of project groups for cooperation with customers and suppliers; extent of influence of suppliers and customers. Product structure: characterization of company as manufacturer of complete facilities or manufacturer...