The Design of Agents Oriented Collaboration in SCM

In today\u27s global marketplace, individual firms no longer compete as independent entities but rather as integral part of supply chain links. In order to cater for the increasing demand on collaboration between supply chain partners, the technology of intelligent agent has gained increased interest in supply chain management. However fewer researches have clearly investigated the mechanism about agent applications in this area. In this paper we are to study the way how to incorporate intelligent agents into supply chain management from the perspective of agent-oriented system analysis and design. A multi-agent framework for collaborative planning, forecasting and replenishment in supply chain management is developed, in which supply chain collaboration models are composed from software components that represent types of supply chain agent, their constituent control elements, and their interaction protocols

Dynamic mutual adjustment search for supply chain operations planning coordination

RÉSUMÉ Les chaînes d’approvisionnement sont des systèmes complexes comprenant plusieurs organisations indépendantes avec des objectifs différents dans un environnement incertain et dynamique. Une question clé dans la gestion de chaîne d’approvisionnement (Supply Chain Management) est la coordination des décisions de planification des opérations. Les systèmes de planification de chaîne d’approvisionnement introduits dans la littérature peuvent être classés en deux systèmes de planification principaux: les systèmes de planification centralisés et les systèmes de planification décentralisés. Les systèmes centralisés peuvent théoriquement optimiser les performances de la chaîne d’approvisionnement bien que leur mise en œuvre nécessite un haut degré d’échange d’informations entre les partenaires de la chaîne d’approvisionnement. Cela conduit à des difficultés lorsque des partenaires indépendants ne veulent pas partager l’information. Afin de répondre à ces difficultés, les systèmes décentralisés de planification des opérations sont conçus dans lesquels chaque membre est une entité économique distincte qui prend ses décisions opérationnelles de manière indépendante, mais avec un niveau minimal d’échange d’information. Dans cette thèse, nous étudions dans un premier temps les méthodes de coordination des processus de planification des opérations dans les chaînes d’approvisionnement proposées dans la littérature. Ensuite, nous proposons un cadre de classification de ces méthodes basée sur la technologie mise en œuvre, et identifions des opportunités de recherches. Dans un deuxième temps, nous proposons une approche de coordination décentralisée qui consiste en un ajustement mutuel des décisions de planification basé sur la programmation mathématique et l’échange d’incitatifs financiers. Ce mécanisme, contrairement à un système centralisé traditionnel, implique deux entreprises, qui interagissent l’une avec l’autre afin d’améliorer leur performance. Dans le cadre de cette approche, seul un petit sous ensemble des solutions de coordination sont considérées, et l’expérimentation montre que cette approche de coordination a un potentiel d’amélioration du profit global tout en préservant l’équité en termes de partage des bénéfices de l’amélioration. Enfin, afin de proposer une méthode de coordination capable d’être utilisable dans le contexte dynamique des chaînes d’approvisionnement, cette thèse propose dans un premier temps une stratégie performante de négociation du fournisseur adaptée à l’approche de coordination proposée, ainsi qu’une stratégie de partage des revenus appliquée à un contexte d’horizon roulant. L’analyse de la performance de cette méthode particulière montre également que l’approche proposée produit une stratégie gagnante-gagnante pour les deux partenaires de la chaîne d’approvisionnement et améliore les résultats de planification.----------ABSTRACT Supply chains are complex systems, which include several independent organizations with different objectives, in dynamic uncertain environment. A key issue in supply chain management (SCM) is the coordination of supply chain operations planning decisions. Supply chain planning systems introduced in the literature can be classified into two main planning systems: centralized and decentralized planning systems. Centralized systems can theoretically optimize supply chain performance although its implementation requires a high degree of information exchange among supply chain partners. This leads to difficulties when independent partners do not want to share information. In order to address these difficulties, decentralized systems are designed for supply chains where each member is a separate economic entity that makes its operational decisions independently, yet with some minimal level of information sharing. In this thesis, we first review supply chain operations planning coordination methods from centralized to decentralized approaches proposed in the literature. Next, we propose a classification scheme of these approaches based on the technology used by the authors. Finally, we identify research opportunities. Second, we propose a decentralized operations planning coordination mechanism referred to as mutual adjustment search (MAS), which is based on a negotiation-like mutual adjustment of planning decisions with financial incentives and rooted in mathematical programming. This mechanism, unlike traditional centralized system, involves two independent enterprises linked by material and non-strategic information flows, which interact with each other in order to coordinate their operations planning, and to improve their individual and collective performance. In this approach, only a few coordination solutions (pairs of coordinated operations plans) are considered and computational analysis shows that this coordination mechanism has the potential to improve global profit, while maintaining fairness in terms of revenue sharing. Finally, in order to develop an approach capable of supporting the dynamic coordination of operations planning in a rolling horizon context, this thesis first proposes a negotiation strategy for the supplier, as well as a revenue sharing protocol. Computational analysis shows that the proposed approach produces a win-win strategy for two partners of supply chain and improves the results of upstream planning

A complex system, agent based model for studying and improving the resilience of production and distribution networks

The very complexity and the extended reach of today’s globe-spanning supply chain networks, the low inventory levels and lack of redundancies required to achieve efficient operations expose businesses to a huge range of unexpected disruptions. This calls for building resilience in supply chains, which is not just recovery from the mishaps, but is a proactive, structured and integrated exploration of capabilities within the supply chain to resist and win against unforeseen happenings. Literature on supply chain and organisational resilience are informative in identifying resilience enhancing strategies and capabilities, but a detailed dynamic analysis of behaviour of the supply chain to understand the suitability of different resilience capabilities over time and under different scenarios is not carried out. The thesis addresses this gap by studying the internal decision making mechanisms, rules and control procedures through development of an agent-based model and its application to a paper tissue manufacturing supply chain. The model with a decentralised informational structure with informed and intelligent combination of push or pull type of replenishment strategy, flexibility, agility, redundancy and efficiency is found to enhance the resilience of the actual supply network in the face of large deviation of demand from forecasts. The effects of adopting several resilience improvement strategies in tandem or in isolation and the impact of applying different behavioural rules by different agents are studied in this thesis by carrying out numerical experimentation. The findings from the experiments suggest that, however flexible the resources are, however well-informed the different members are, however well-integrated the members are through coordination and communication, however wellequipped a supply chain is with mitigation and recovery capabilities the individual managerial judgements that can obtain a balance between various dimensions of performance (both global and local efficiency, quality and speed of responding to customer orders) and resilience (speedy reaction, maintaining buffers, flexibility in resource management) play the most important role in improving the resilience of the entire network. An important contribution of this thesis is to produce a conceptual framework for supply chain resilience. This framework is used to test the appropriateness of different resilience enhancement procedures. Another significant contribution of this thesis is to provide a theoretical template for further research in supply chain resilience. The template will guide development of effective procedures for managing different situations of uncertainty. By using complex systems modelling methods, such as multi-agent models described in the thesis, outcomes of the system under a significant range of possible agent behavioural rules and environmental events can be explored, and improved levels of functioning and of resilience can be found. Building such models as a means to understand and improve resilience of supply networks is a significant contribution.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo