Agent-Based E-Supply Chain Decision Support

The global Internet economy is expected, over time, to give rise to increasingly agile practices where new supply chain arrangements are dynamically set up in response to changing business conditions and demands for highly customized products and services. To implement these "e-supply chain" practices, enterprises need the ability to rapidly evaluate new business opportunities and dynamically identify the best potential supply chain partners to respond to them. They also need the ability to effectively coordinate production and delivery of goods or services across the resulting value chains. In this article, we introduce MASCOT, an agent-based decision support environment for dynamic supply chain management. MASCOT agents help users distributed across multiple organizations and across different levels within a given enterprise to collaborate on the development and revision of supply chain solutions, as they evaluate different business opportunities (e.g., requests for bids from potential customers) and different sourcing options. This article also discusses new coordination protocols, developed within the context of MASCOT and aimed at better exploiting the power of finite capacity scheduling functionality across the supply chain. Empirical results are presented quantifying the benefits afforded by these new protocols under different loads and supply chain configurations.     

INFORMATION GAMING IN DEMAND COLLABORATION AND SUPPLY CHAIN PERFORMANCE

Demand collaboration has recently been promoted by industry leaders as an important tool for supply chain management. Its greatest significance beyond the sharing of point‐of‐sale and forecast information stems from its potential to allow supply chain partners to extract private market information from each other for more effective planning and better supply chain performance. A simulation framework based on actual business processes is developed to investigate the underlying drivers of demand collaboration and the inherent risks and benefits of such collaboration.     

Collaborative Planning in Multi-tier Supply Chains Supported by a Negotiation-Based Mechanism and Multi-agent System

Effective business process collaboration between companies operating in a supply chain can bring about important benefits, but several barriers need to be overcome. One important obstacle evidenced by professionals is related to the information and communication technologies used to support such collaboration. Although a supplier and a manufacturer may be willing to establish a closer relationship, a lack of easy-to-operate enterprise applications can thwart their collaborative ambitions. Specific technologies are required for each type of collaborative business process as generic applications do not lend themselves to addressing complex situations. Complexity lies in the need to consider common standards for information and decision exchanges, and for designing and implementing the right information and decision flow among supply chain members to support collaborative processes. This paper focuses on collaboration of demand, production and replenishment planning along a supply chain, and proposes a multi-tier, negotiation-based mechanism supported by a multi-agent system. The research hypothesis is that improvements in the service and profit level of supply chain members, and in the entire supply chain, can be achieved by implementing this form of collaboration. The proposed collaborative planning model was used to address a real automotive supply chain configuration for the purpose of testing its appropriateness and validating its performance.     

论基于电子商务的供应链管理

电子商务的迅猛发展,已深刻地影响和改变了企业传统的供应链管理。为提高企业管理水平,本文在阐述电子商务与供应链管理含义的基础上,分析了电子商务环境下集成化供应链管理的特点,并进一步探讨了电子商务环境下供应链的构建方略。     

供应链提前期压缩问题研究

本文认为,压缩供应连提前期具有重要战略意义,可以更好地实现供应链管理的目标,减少供应链非增值过程,提高供应链需求预测的准确性,减轻供应链中的牛鞭效应,避免供应链销售损失。文章提出,供应链提前期的压缩就是针对物流提前期和信息提前期进行的时间压缩,但二者并不是独立进行的,而是采取综合的时间压缩措施诸如改善业务流程,采取延迟化策略,运用各种供应链管理模式,利用并行工程技术,实施绿色再制造,充分利用信息技术等。     

基于agent跨组织工作流系统模型的研究

工作流技术是实现企业业务过程建模,业务过程管理和集成,最终实现业务过程自动化的核心技术,为支持企业间的协同工作提供了一种有效的方法。但是现有的工作流技术在虚拟企业中明显存在着开放性和动态交互性等方面的不足,本文正是针对此点提出了一种基于 Agent 工作流建模方法,并建立了相应的整体模型。     

中央采购在连锁商业中的应用探讨

中央采购是由企业总部统一采购、统一配送到不同区域的各个门店的经济活动过程。其实施对连锁商业具有众多的优势,但在实施过程中也存在很多难点。连锁商业企业只有重视中央采购智能管理信息系统建设,强化龙头企业供应链管理思想,严格控制采购成本,不断提高企业物流管理水平,才能顺利实现中央采购,增强竞争优势。     

供应链管理实践、供应链敏捷性对企业绩效的影响研究

市场竞争逐渐由企业间的竞争转化为供应链间的竞争,供应链管理日益受到关注。文章采集163家企业信息进行实证分析,探索供应链管理实践和供应链敏捷性对企业绩效的影响与作用机制。研究结果表明：供应链管理实践对企业绩效具有直接正向影响,供应链管理实践对供应链敏捷性具有直接正向影响,供应链敏捷性对企业绩效具有直接正向影响且在供应链管理实践与企业绩效之间发挥部分中介作用。     

Modeling and Analysis of Reverse Logistics

Many modeling techniques have been developed to maximize the effectiveness and efficiency of forward logistics and supply chain management. As this article will illustrate, modeling techniques can be helpful in improving the management of reverse logistics as well. Companies and researchers are just beginning to appreciate the important differences between forward and reverse chains, and there is great opportunity to apply modeling methodologies to managing reverse logistics problems and issues. This article describes how modeling techniques can be utilized to improve reverse logistics processes and aid in solving real‐world reverse logistics problems. We focus on specific reverse logistics processes that firms, which sell products, are likely to address. In fact, the area of reverse logistics has broadened of late to include many activities that were not originally part of simply returning consumer products to a retailer. Herein, we present an overview of opportunities, where improved modeling efforts should be able to provide substantial benefits to supply chain professionals.     

Identifying supply chain solutions in the UK house building sector

This paper identifies the problems of the UK housing industry and offers solutions to improving its overall performance and competitiveness. The terrain scanning methodology, which is a supply chain diagnostic, is used to gain an in-depth understanding of various business participants and supply chain processes. A quasi-Delphi study is used to identify areas for improving business and supply chain processes. The findings reveal that a change of “mind-set”, a shift toward process orientation and improved communications, are essential actions that need to be addressed by the UK housing sector to improve its performance and competitiveness. The paper concludes by suggesting that these three actions will assist UK housing companies in their move towards implementing supply chain management strategies.     

Successful implementation of ERP systems in small businesses: a case study in Korea

The implementation of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems supporting business processes across many different departments and partners has been known to be much more difficult than the development of a computer application supporting a single business function. In this article, we present a case study of an ERP system application by a small business. Jinyang Oil Seal Co., Ltd. is a professional oil seal manufacturer for automobiles and electronic equipment in Korea. Jinyang has recently adopted and implemented an ERP system, which has helped the organization to achieve a competitive advantage. This article reports how Jinyang coped with the typical challenges that most small business organizations face when implementing an ERP system.     

The Value of Information Integration in Meeting Delivery Dates

In this article, we consider the value of shared information within a business network. To make the problem concrete, we focus on a specific operational problem: How the final supplier to the customer determines promised delivery dates. In a traditional supply chain, the final supplier has little or no information on the delivery performance of intermediate suppliers and thus, has limited information with which to set delivery dates. On the other hand, in an information-integrated business network, the final supplier's enterprise resource planning (ERP) system can interact with all the intermediate suppliers' ERP systems to determine exactly how far ahead or behind schedule the network is in meeting the needs of a specific customer. This information should improve the final supplier's ability to set realistic delivery dates. We attempt to quantify the value of this information and determine precisely why it is valuable so that management can best exploit information integration.

We use a modeling approach in this research, beginning with simple analytic models and progressing to more realistic simulation models. Our analytic model establishes an important principle: Information integration not only significantly improves the average on-time delivery performance of a business network, but also dramatically improves its worst-case performance. Because customer dissatisfaction is generally associated with worst-case performance, information integration may be highly beneficial even if its effect on average on-time delivery is small. Simulation models allow us to compare the performance of more realistic business networks. These models suggest, for example, that the value of information integration is dependent on both the structure of the network itself (whether serial or arborescent) and on the typical customer order date in the production cycle. These insights allow us to begin to identify the types of business networks in which information integration will have the highest value.     

基于CSR在供应链和网络中的应用研究

在供应链和网络管理过程中需要CSR(企业社会责任)整合,需要企业的内部和外部管理的共同努力。在整个企业中,上到高层管理人员,下到生产区的人员,都在生产作业过程中实行这一措施。在供应链和网络中我们通过先进的质量管理理念来实现CSR整合,这在供应链企业外部管理中也有非常重要的作用。在本文中我们借助模型讨论CSR整合中的能力分析和监控,将它的作用由静态模型转化为动态模型,并分析合作的循环发展,以及在供应链和网络中的信任系数。     

基于平衡计分卡的供应链战略联盟绩效评价指标的设计

现代供应链战略联盟是供应链节点上各个企业充分利用各自核心竞争优势相互合作来提高企业自身的竞争优势,实现整个价值链增值最大化的企业战略联盟。为了确保供应链战略联盟中的各个企业能够合理有效的分配利益以及获得利益最大化,就要加强供应链战略联盟的绩效评价。利用平衡计分卡这一工具,从联盟系统指标、客户指标、财务指标、业务流程指标和创新与发展指标等维度设计相应的评价指标,应遵循系统性原则、科学性原则、可操作性原则、战略导向性原则;能够适度反映企业战略思维和经营策略。     

Tortoise,not the hare: Digital transformation of supply chain business processes

With the rapid development of digital technologies, many supply chain professionals are wondering how to move forward. Three technologies are poised to change supply chain business processes: robotic process automation (RPA), artificial intelligence (AI)/machine learning (ML) and blockchain. Based on interviews with supply chain professionals in 14 large, mature manufacturing and service organizations, we outline the promise of each technology and forecast their broad-scale adoption potential. Organizations should take the following measures to ensure their readiness to adopt and effectively use one or more of these technologies: (1) identify a supply chain technology visionary who can lead through the maze of technologies and the changing digital landscape, (2) develop a digital technology roadmap for their supply chain processes, and (3) update foundational information systems.     

OVERCOMING SPREADSHEET RISK IN SUPPLY CHAIN MODELING

Spreadsheet optimization modeling plays an important role in the management of today's sophisticated supply chains. However, despite the advantages of spreadsheets (or in some cases because of these advantages) there are significant risks associated with spreadsheet models. Spreadsheet risk is defined as the chance of adverse operational or financial consequences due to erroneous creation, maintenance, and/or use of spreadsheet models. Such errors arise because the intrinsic complexity of optimization models is beyond the expertise of many non‐technical managers. In this article we discuss procedures that we developed for managing the substantial risks associated with the use of spreadsheets for supply chain optimization. The issues we address go far beyond simple data entry mistakes, which are possible in virtually every aspect of business and can never be completely eliminated.     

Relational and Process Multiplexity in Vertical Supply Chain Triads: An Exploration in the U.S. Restaurant Industry

Both supply chain relationships and process connections between organizational units have been studied in business research, to enhance the understanding of supply chain integration, and to explore the differential outcomes of both types of connections for business and functional performance. However, the extant research remains deficient in two ways: within individual studies, researchers have operationalized supply chain connectivity unidimensionally, with the concept of connectivity constrained to either social relations or operational/process ties while disregarding the other viewpoint. Additionally, researchers have persistently designed studies to evaluate dyadic structures, while foregoing the larger, more intricate structures representative of complex supply chains. We address these issues by modeling supply chain connectivity as having multiple relational‐ and process‐based threads comprising linkages, and by empirically testing a set of theorized relationships describing vertical triadic supply chain networks (manufacturer, broker, retailer) within the U.S. restaurant industry. We find that increased supply chain connectivity improves chain performance, but this improvement is more directly attributable to process‐based linkages than relational linkages, which impact performance only through the process mediator variable, suggesting that current theories of interorganizational relationalism may lack complete conceptualization. Implications of these findings for managers and the academy are highlighted, and areas of follow‐on research are discussed.     

INTERORGANIZATIONAL CITIZENSHIP BEHAVIORS: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY

Exchanges among firms operating in supply chains are complex due to relational embeddedness, i.e., the extent to which relationships, rather than economic rationality, govern firm‐to‐firm interactions. For many years interfirm relationships were assumed to be best managed via coercive tactics. However, for the last two decades much attention has been given in the literature to more relational forms of governance, and recent supply chain research examining relationship nature, magnitude, and type implies the need for an alternative symbiotic explanation for supply chain relationship effectiveness. To address this void in the literature, this article introduces the concept of interorganizational citizenship behaviors (ICB's). Based on a review of literature from multiple business domains, common types of ICB's are identified, and research hypotheses are developed and tested. Future research initiatives and implications for supply chain management practice are also provided.     

Trajectories for Driving the Diffusion of e-Negotiation Service Providers in Supply Chains: An Action Research Approach

ABSTRACT

The recent proliferation of online-based trade makes negotiations with service providers for global supply networks evermore challenging. The Internet is believed to be a viable means for enabling and facilitating these supply chain interactions. As such, commercial web-based services that support negotiation processes have emerged (i.e., e-negotiation services). Even though these services have promising benefits for supply chain participants, they have not been accepted by most business users. Current e-negotiation studies fail to capture the substantive reasons of this low acceptance as they typically ignore real-world aspects of commercial negotiations. As such, this study argues that an action research approach is a plausible means to study this issue, and to drive changes in the e-negotiations services market. Accordingly, a research plan is outlined with guidelines and recommendations for future action research projects.     

互联网环境下的供应链管理模型方法综述

随着互联网时代的到来,供应链管理面临许多新的挑战和机遇。相应的供应链管理模型比起传统环境下的供应链管理模型要改变很多。根据互联网环境下供应链管理模型在各领域的发展概况,对未来由于电子商务创造机会和变化进行探讨。