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Examines the recent debate concerning traditional versus activity‐based approaches to management accounting information in general and product costing/pricing decisions in particular. Tests the relevance of activity‐based costing techniques in a real‐life manufacturing environment – pharmaceutical products. Examines the impact on product costs of changing to an activity‐based overhead allocation environment. The pilot results were sufficiently encouraging to suggest improved management information arising from a full‐scale implementation.

Activity‐based costing (ABC) is a tool used by managers to more closely approximate the “true costs” of operations. The application of ABC in logistics is more commonplace today than just a few years ago, though still far short of universal. Sound tracking of operational costs is critical when pursuing the logistics objective of providing desired customer service at the lowest total cost. This research illustrates an actual application of ABC to reverse logistics activities performed across supply chain organizations. More specifically, a case study of a Michigan beverage distributor and retailer that collect empty beverage containers for recycling purposes is presented. The case study demonstrates the ABC application in detail and discusses the re‐engineering of supply chain‐wide processes resulting from the analysis.

In the era of competitive global environment and technology‐based organizations managers are, more than ever, pressured to find ways to maintain their competitive advantage. In order to achieve and sustain a competitive advantage, managers must examine the internal processes of their companies. The firm produces products or provide services by performing a set of activities that create value. Increasing the value of these activities can increase the competitive advantage of a firm. There are several methods that have been developed for adding value to the core activities in the firm. One method that is gaining popularity among companies is activity‐based cost management (ABCM). ABCM as a system can provide managers with a strategic view of the activities that are essential to the competitive nature of the enterprise.

This paper seeks to introduce a conceptual methodology to support decisions about environmental systems.

The methodology incorporates activity‐based costing and management, the analytic hierarchy process, and business process modeling using the IDEF0 method.

An illustrative example that applies the methodology to a semiconductor manufacturing facility is presented in the paper. The company used the results to analyze a process improvement.

The complexities and nuances of the approach will require facilitation and support. Making the technique more transparent and available to management is a barrier to its diffusion and application.

Potential managerial application and implications include areas such as product cost management, business process design and technology selection.

Application of the methodology encourages management to more fully assess the environmental implications of their decision in evaluating alternative technological processes while also allowing for the inclusion of other organizational decision dimensions.

This study addresses the prevailing complexities and limitations in estimating and managing construction overhead costs (COCs) in the existing literature, with the purpose of enhancing the accuracy of cost performance indicators in construction project management.

An innovative approach is proposed, employing the activity-based costing (ABC) accounting method combined with building information modelling (BIM) to assign real overhead costs to project activities. This study, distinguished by its incorporation of a real case study, focuses on an administrative building with a four-story concrete structure. It establishes an automated method for evaluating project cost performance through the detailed analysis of earned value management (EVM) cost indicators derived from ABC results and BIM data.

The results show that the ABC integration improves the accuracy of cost performance indicators by over 9%, revealing the project's true cost index for the first time and demonstrating the substantial value of the approach in construction engineering and management.

The current study highlights a notable gap in the existing literature, addressing the challenges in onsite overhead cost estimation and offering a solution that incorporates the state-of-the-art techniques.

The proposed method has significant implications for project managers and practitioners, enabling better-informed decisions based on precise cost data, ultimately leading to enhanced project outcomes.

This research uniquely combines ABC and BIM, presenting a pioneering solution for the accurate estimation and management of COCs in construction projects, adding significant value to the current body of knowledge in this field.

As the manufacturing environment moves to computer‐integrated manufacturing and the products that are manufactured are diverse, conventional cost systems can report seriously distorted product costs. Discusses the solutions to these problems. Activity‐based costing, initiated and popularized by Robin Cooper and Robert S. Kaplan, can solve these distorted problems. Activity‐based costing (ABC) is defined as “the collection of financial and operation performance tracing the significant activities of the firm‐to‐product cost”. Discusses the ABC system design and ABC implementation. The five steps in the design of an ABC system are: aggregate actions into activities; report the cost of activities; identify activity centres; select first‐stage cost drivers; and select second‐stage cost drivers. The implementation plan consists of seven phases: an ABC seminar; a design seminar; design and data gathering; progress meetings; an executive seminar; result meetings; and interpretation meetings.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the interactions between accounting and marketing activities in a Taiwanese telecommunication firm by demonstrating the dramatic impact that improved costing methods had on the firm’s customer portfolio management activities and consequently on the firm’s bottom line.

The paper presents a case study of a firm in the highly competitive telecommunications industry in Taiwan. The case study was constructed by interviewing key individuals within the organization over an extended period and supplementing those reports with an analysis of internal company documents.

The firm dramatically increased profitability through the integration of activity-based costing into their customer portfolio framework requiring marketing and accounting functions to work closely together. In this rapidly evolving market, cost allocation and customer portfolio management are indispensable. Identifying accurate costs and keeping key customers is a critical issue for the case company. While theoretically the approach is simple, in practice considerable hurdles needed to be overcome.

While considerable literature suggests that customer profitability drives the management of an organization’s customer portfolio, critical to the success of such an endeavor is the accurate calculation and allocation of costs to individual customers. As an interdisciplinary study, this paper provides insights for both accounting and marketing highlighting their reliance on each other in a sound firm. The results of this paper will serve as a supplement to past customer portfolio management research as well as a reference for any firm seeking to enhance their approach to portfolio management.

Aims to increase the knowledge about benefits and drawbacks when a service firm implements activity‐based cost systems as a managerial tool for calculating the costs of different services. States that an activity‐based costing system has its starting‐point in a customer′s total perceived service quality as the needs of the customers must be met; otherwise the service firm is unable to produce the right services at the right quality level. Claims that in service firms a common problem is that overhead costs are extensive and that it is difficult to allocate costs to the right services as many activities must be carried out to produce a service. States that in some service firms it is, however, quite easy to trace costs to the right service, e.g. a bookkeeping firm.

Activity‐based costing (ABC) is gradually being utilized as more of a decision‐making tool than an accounting tool. This paper investigates how, after almost a decade of slow growth, ABC is gaining acceptance as a tool to determine the true costs of marketing and logistics activities. How ABC provides managers with considerable insights into how various products, territories, and customers play major roles in logistic and marketing activities and, consequently, drive total costs is discussed. The advantages of the ABC model in terms of providing the right information to marketing managers with regard to which products, customers, or territories are more important and which could be eliminated without affecting the overall objectives of the firm are presented. The paper concludes by identifying ABC's shortcomings and the promise it holds for the modern enterprise.