A Simulation Model Articulation of the REA Ontology

This paper demonstrates how the REA enterprise ontology can be used to construct simulation models for business processes, value chains and collaboration spaces in supply chains. These models support various high-level and operational management simulation applications, e.g. the analysis of enterprise sustainability and day-to-day planning. First, the basic constructs of the REA ontology and the ExSpect modelling language for simulation are introduced. Second, collaboration space, value chain and business process models and their conceptual dependencies are shown, using the ExSpect language. Third, an exhibit demonstrates the use of value chain models in predicting the financial performance of an enterprise

Performance modeling of e-procurement workflow using Generalised Stochastic Petri net (GSPN)

This paper proposes a Generalised Stochastic Petri net (GSPN) model representing a generic e-procurement workflow process. The model displays the dynamic behaviour of the system and shows the inter relationship of process activities. An analysis based on matrix equation approach enabled users to analyse the critical system's states, and thus justify the process performance. The results obtained allow users for better decision making in improving e-procurement workflow performance

Multi Site Coordination using a Multi-Agent System

A new approach of coordination of decisions in a multi site system is proposed. It is based this approach on a multi-agent concept and on the principle of distributed network of enterprises. For this purpose, each enterprise is defined as autonomous and performs simultaneously at the local and global levels. The basic component of our approach is a so-called Virtual Enterprise Node (VEN), where the enterprise network is represented as a set of tiers (like in a product breakdown structure). Within the network, each partner constitutes a VEN, which is in contact with several customers and suppliers. Exchanges between the VENs ensure the autonomy of decision, and guarantiee the consistency of information and material flows. Only two complementary VEN agents are necessary: one for external interactions, the Negotiator Agent (NA) and one for the planning of internal decisions, the Planner Agent (PA). If supply problems occur in the network, two other agents are defined: the Tier Negotiator Agent (TNA) working at the tier level only and the Supply Chain Mediator Agent (SCMA) working at the level of the enterprise network. These two agents are only active when the perturbation occurs. Otherwise, the VENs process the flow of information alone. With this new approach, managing enterprise network becomes much more transparent and looks like managing a simple enterprise in the network. The use of a Multi-Agent System (MAS) allows physical distribution of the decisional system, and procures a heterarchical organization structure with a decentralized control that guaranties the autonomy of each entity and the flexibility of the network

Enhancing the Supply Chain Performance by Integrating Simulated and Physical Agents into Organizational Information Systems

As the business environment gets more complicated, organizations must be able to respond to the business changes and adjust themselves quickly to gain their competitive advantages. This study proposes an integrated agent system, called SPA, which coordinates simulated and physical agents to provide an efficient way for organizations to meet the challenges in managing supply chains. In the integrated framework, physical agents coordinate with inter-organizations\' physical agents to form workable business processes and detect the variations occurring in the outside world, whereas simulated agents model and analyze the what-if scenarios to support physical agents in making decisions. This study uses a supply chain that produces digital still cameras as an example to demonstrate how the SPA works. In this example, individual information systems of the involved companies equip with the SPA and the entire supply chain is modeled as a hierarchical object oriented Petri nets. The SPA here applies the modified AGNES data clustering technique and the moving average approach to help each firm generalize customers\' past demand patterns and forecast their future demands. The amplitude of forecasting errors caused by bullwhip effects is used as a metric to evaluate the degree that the SPA affects the supply chain performance. The experimental results show that the SPA benefits the entire supply chain by reducing the bullwhip effects and forecasting errors in a dynamic environment.Supply Chain Performance Enhancement; Bullwhip Effects; Simulated Agents; Physical Agents; Dynamic Customer Demand Pattern Discovery

Managing Supply Chain Events to Build Sense-and-Respond Capability

As supply chains become more dynamic, there is a need for a sense-and-respond capability to react to events in a real-time manner. In this paper, we propose Petri nets extended with time and color (for case data) as a formalism for doing so. Hence, we describe seven basic patterns that are used to capture modeling concepts that arise commonly in supply chains. These basic patterns may be used by themselves and also be combined to create new patterns. Next, we show how to use the patterns as building blocks to model a complete supply chain and analyze it using dependency graphs and simulation. Dependency graphs can be used to analyze the various events and their causes. Simulation was, in addition, used to analyze various performance indicators (e.g. fill rates, replenishment times, and lead times) under different supply chain strategies. We performed sensitivity analysis to study the effect of changing parameter values on the performance indicators. In the experiments, by cutting resolution time for production delays in half (strategy 1), we were able to increase order fill rate from 89% to 95%. Similarly, upon raising the probability of successful alternative sourcing (strategy 2) from 0.5 to 0.7 the order fill rate again increased from 89% to 95%. We show that by modeling timing and causality issues accurately, it is possible to improve supply chain performance

SIMULATING EXOGENOUS SHOCKS IN COMPLEX SUPPLY NETWORKS USING MODULAR STOCHASTIC PETRI NETS

Almost all major companies are embedded in complex, global supply networks, consisting of multiple nested supply chains, and building up a high level of complexity. Exogenous shocks on these networks (e.g. natural disasters) can directly and indirectly impact companies and even cause their entire supply network to fail. However, today it is extremely difficult for a company to predict the actual impact of an exogenous shock on its supply network. Hence, companies are not able to identify adequate counteractive measures. Therefore safeguarding measures are oftentimes insufficient or even counterproductive. This paper deals with modelling, analyzing and quantifying impacts of exogenous shocks on supply networks using Petri Nets. It provides means to simulate the vulnerability of different network constellations regarding exogenous influences. In order to evaluate the proposed method, we simulate different intensities of an exogenous shock delaying the delivery for an exemplary supply network. We thereby illustrate which results could be yielded from a real-world application. For our exemplary network we find that the marginal effect of a disruption declines with an increasing intensity of shock. Moreover, the impact of shocks can be mitigated by appropriate counteractive measures like in this example by an increased safety margin of stock

A Shared Information-Based Petri Net Model for Service Parts Planning

A considerable amount of electronic products are returned after sales, especially in such an economic downturn situation. After repair and refurbishment, the used products can be returned into the markets which fulfill the forward supply chains into a close loop. In this paper, we consider the service parts planning in the beginning of product rolling plan together with the sales through quantities to minimize the inventory level in the period of product lifecycle. A Petri Net is used to model a simple closed-loop supply chain with shared sales information. PUSH and PULL inventory policies are used in this research. Finally, it is investigated how a third party service provider uses this mechanism to improve the accuracy of inventory planning

Hybrid Petri-nets for Modeling and Performance Evaluation of Supply Chains

Cataloged from PDF version of article.Modelling and analysis of complex and co-ordinated supply chains is a crucial task due to its inherent complexity and uncertainty. Therefore, the current research direction is to devise an efficient modelling technique that maps the dynamics of a real life supply chain and assists industrial practitioners in evaluating and comparing their network with other competing networks. Here an effective modelling technique, the hybrid Petri-net, is proposed to efficiently handle the dynamic behaviour of the supply chain. This modelling methodology embeds two enticing features, i.e. cost and batch sizes, in deterministic and stochastic Petri-net for the modelling and performance evaluation of supply chain networks. The model is subsequently used for risk management to investigate the issues of supply chain vulnerability and risk that has become a major research subject in recent years. In the test bed, a simple productive supply chain and an industrial supply chain are modelled with fundamental inventory replenishment policy. Subsequently, its performance is evaluated along with the identification and assessment of risk factors using analytical and simulation techniques respectively. Thus, this paper presents a complete package for industrial practitioners to model, evaluate performance and manage risky events in a supply chain