Leaning towards agile

Different market conditions require organisations to respond in a variety of ways. The authors suggest that companies within a turbulent market environment will need to operate in a more responsive manner and adopt an agile philosophy. An agile manufacturer can be defined as the fastest to market, with the lowest total cost and the greatest ability to meet varied customer requirements - the final measure being the ability to delight the customer     

动态联盟和敏捷供应链

动态联盟的建立是为了响应竞争环境的快速变化或一个新的市场机遇。它是一个结盟企业的利益共同体,是实现全球化敏捷生产的主要方式。敏捷供应链是支持动态联盟优化运行的重要使能技术。本文将主要针对在中国企业开展动态联盟的要求,困难和特点进行初步的分析,并重点围绕供应链的敏捷性,这一支持动态联盟优化运行的关键技术,进行深入的讨论,提出了一个基于智能代理和可重构原理的解决方案。     

Greater than the sum of its parts [outsourced manufacturing]

In the world of electronics manufacturing, numerous complex supply chains encompassing product specifiers and designers, manufacturers, material suppliers, transporters, packagers, and distributors are evident. Each link in the supply chain has its own cost base with a desire to keep costs down while increasing profit. To help companies calculate the best manufacturing strategy tailored to their needs, Flextronics has developed a global supply chain analysis tool called Simplex. This tool provides a complete cost analysis of the total supply chains, including the best source for raw material, turnaround time, logistics cost, cost of capital, and inventory.     

Why bad forecasts can be good for business...[demand forecasting]

In order for companies to be more responsive to actual customer demand, some degree of forecasting is necessary. In a study on supply chain improvement, the results indicate the importance of demand forecasting. The study show that manufacturers need to create a model of the near future, their demand forecast, to enable them to best configure their supply chain's resources. Forecasting is as important as ever, even as companies seek to become as responsive as possible. New software tools help companies make forecasting less of a black art and more of a scientific process. However, it is key that judgement is used to assess what the software proposes and collaboration, also enabled through software and the Internet, helps involve all key stakeholders to create a robust forecast that the business can work to.     

Decentralised production-distribution planning system using collaborative agents in supply chain network

With the fast development of information technology and the global market, collaboration between different functional units in a supply chain becomes one of the most critical factors for global companies to respond to rapid changes in customer needs and increase the efficiency of the whole supply chain. This supply chain environment requires a production-distribution planning system to enable the collaboration between production and distribution units more quickly and orderly. Generally, collaboration in a supply chain needs to resolve conflicts between two decentralised functional units, because each unit tries to locally minimise its own costs, not the overall supply chain costs. Also, there exists incomplete information sharing according to the information privacy of each functional unit. This paper proposes a decentralised production-distribution planning system using collaborative agents that can efficiently mediate the planning gaps between two decentralised planning functions: production and distribution. The validity of collaborative-agent model has been shown using some lemmas and numerical examples.     

敏捷供应链管理关键技术

敏捷供应链是支持动态联盟优化运行的重要使能技术。敏捷供应链管理的研究与实现是一个复杂的系统工程,它牵淑到很多思想和技术的应用。统一的动态联盟企业建模技术、分布计算技术、软件系统的可重构技术、对Ｌｅｇａｃｙ系统的封装技术、Ｉｎｇｅｒｎｅｔ／Ｅｘｔｒａｎｅｔ环境下动态联盟企业信息的安全保证等,是敏捷供应链管理的几个关键技术。     

A decision-support framework for agile enterprise partnering

Being an essential part of an agile supply-chain management and focusing on selecting business partners, agile enterprise partnering is regarded as a key activity that can make a significant contribution to the development of a successful supply chain. This paper proposes a decision-support framework for the evaluation and selection of business partners in order to help the industry form agile supply chains. Based on literature review and empirical studies, the proposed framework organizes 32 agility criteria into ten decision domains according to their inherent characteristics. The identified criteria and decision domains form a hierarchy that acts as an agile partner-assessment model. In order to provide empirical evidence for the proposed model, a case study is conducted. Using the data collected from site visits and interviews, the weight values of decision domains and criteria are determined via a pairwise comparison method. Considering the incomplete and vague nature of the collected data, an evidential reasoning and synthesis approach is employed to conduct multi-criteria and multi-level synthesis. The advantages of the proposed methodology and methods are demonstrated by the case study results.     

Customised, integrated and agile [supply chains]

There are three challenges for the future supply chain; to be customised, integrated and agile. The article discusses whether they can be achieved, and how. Supply chains of the future will be shaped by pioneers who are prepared to meet the marketing challenges of tomorrow with the emerging technologies of today, and by making a quantum leap in terms of how supply chain relationships are managed. The technology is here, the new relationships that are needed truly to exploit it need an even greater act of faith.     

Study on multi-agent-based agile supply chain management

In a worldwide network of suppliers, factories, warehouses, distribution centres and retailers, the supply chain plays a very important role in the acquisition, transformation, and delivery of raw materials and products. One of the most important characteristics of agile supply chain is the ability to reconfigure dynamically and quickly according to demand changes in the market. In this paper, concepts and characteristics of an agile supply chain are discussed and the agile supply chain is regarded as one of the pivotal technologies of agile manufacture based on dynamic alliance. Also, the importance of coordination in supply chain is emphasised and a general architecture of agile supply chain management is presented based on a multi-agent theory, in which the supply chain is managed by a set of intelligent agents for one or more activities. The supply chain management system functions are to coordinate its agents. Agent functionalities and responsibilities are defined respectively, and a contract net protocol joint with case-based reasoning for coordination and an algorithm for task allocation is presented.     

敏捷供应链重组过程研究

全球经济的发展和企业面临的动态变化的市场环境对制造业提出了敏捷性的要求 ,敏捷供应链管理成为当今商业界和理论界研究的热点。可重组性是敏捷供应链的一个重要特征 ,文中探讨了敏捷供应链重组的过程和相关技术 ,采用多主体思想建立可重组供应链系统的总体框架 ,以满足系统的可重构、可重用、可扩展的要求 ,以一虚拟的供应链为例进行计算 ,说明整体绩效衡量在供应链重组过程中的作用     

基于核心功能结构的敏捷供需链管理与优化

为提高企业对市场需求的快速响应,提出基于核心功能结构(Critical Function Structure,CFS)的敏捷供需链系统模型.针对市场需求的不确定性,重点研究敏捷供需链的管理及其优化方法,在此基础上提出基于网络的敏捷供需链管理与优化体系结构,进一步增强整个供需链的敏捷性和管理优化决策的准确性和预见性,提高整个供需链的效率和竞争力.     

The demand driven chain [product configurator]

The configurator is a family of software systems that typically provides the customer with an interface to show the product range, enables customer-driven product configuration and may allow the ordering of configured product. In this paper, the author explains how a product configurator can help with demand management. A configurator can be an important driver for change in the supply chain infrastructure because it contains key information on customer preferences. It can also provide important data source - data can be mined from it on customer ordering behaviour, which may inform future strategy and be used for forecasting and supply chain management.     

基于交互双层模糊规划的敏捷供应链构建与优化

分析了供应链中不确定性的来源,并用梯形模糊数表达了供应链参数中的不确定性,用梯级平均综合法将模糊数转换为精确数。在分析现有各种合作伙伴决策和供应链构建方法的基础上,提出了基于交互双层模糊规划方法,利用软件LINGO 13求解该模糊规划,得出最终的精选合作伙伴及最优订货量。该方法兼顾了上下层各自的利益需求,并经过上下层决策者的反复交互协商,最终得到上下层决策者均可接受的妥协优化解。通过一个实例进一步阐述了该方法的决策步骤,并指出了该方法相较于其他方法的优缺点及下一步的研究思路。     

Relate, empower and free [collaborative product commerce]

The need to increase communication between internal departments, as well as with suppliers and customers, across a global setting has been the driving force behind a new class of information technology solutions known as collaborative product commerce (CPC). These solutions are contributing to the disintegration of the vertical organisation of companies, and usher in the emergence of value webs, made up of design, supply and service chains. It is indicated that the exponential growth in the available technologies has arisen from the reductionism-the describe-predict-and-control paradigm-that is a foundation of Western culture     

Internet-based collaborative product development chain for networked product development

Product development in the manufacturing industry has been facing unprecedented challenges brought about by ever-changing global and competitive market conditions as well as changing individual customer demands. As manufacturing enterprises become more specialized, they need to communicate and work concurrently on a large volume of product data covering their factories, sub-contractors as well as suppliers. The collaboration and cooperation between enterprises is changing from a supply chain based on material flow to a collaborative product development chain based on task flow. Computer network technologies, especially the Internet, have injected velocity into product development activities and enabled companies to shift their traditionally centralized product development philosophy to networked product development philosophy. This paper introduces a new paradigm called Internet-based collaborative product development chain (ICPDC) to answer the aforementioned needs of current product development. It connects users in geographically different locations to carry out product development activities simultaneously and collaboratively using a series of tools, including product management tools, workflow management tools, and project management tools. Some key aspects of the ICPDC, including its concept, collaboration mechanism, constituents and fashioning principle, are introduced in detail. Furthermore, a framework for the ICPDC based on a Brower/Server is proposed. Finally, a prototype is implemented using web services technology and .Net programming language to demonstrate the feasibility of the structure and the collaborative approach that has been developed.     

敏捷企业合作环境下的企业注册代理

针对合作环境建模下的三层合作结构模式和三层合作过程模式，介绍了企业注册代理层提供的功能、服务及体系结构。在市场机遇下，盟主需要建立动态联盟时，可以委托企业注册代理实现合作，企业注册代理根据合作请示寻找合作伙伴，建立合作模型，分析合作可行性等，为敏捷企业的合作提供支持，同时企业注册代理还可以作为支持敏捷企业的基础设施，为加入敏捷企业的成员公司提供集成环境和应用服务。     

Connecting to the vision [next generation intelligence]

Next generation intelligence of the 21st century will contain three central tenets that govern the performance of organizations: vision, connection, and build. Next generation intelligence such as multi-agent system software means that by factoring in attributes such as cost, assets, quality, time-to-market, customer satisfaction, finance, logistics, manufacturing, demand scheduling, scenario planning, and strategic and operational contingencies, it can convert concepts into specifications, and specifications into profits. Radio frequency identification (RFID) technologies also offer organizations greater supply chain visibility and control over their security and assets such as inventory and working capital, in stock and in transit. In this article, an application of next generation intelligence in the automotive industry is presented.     

敏捷供应链绩效评价过程与方法研究

根据敏捷供应链运营过程特点，研究了敏捷供应链绩效评价指标体系的结构，建立了一种分层的、适用于敏捷供应链战略层决策的整体绩效评价指标体系。讨论了敏捷供应链绩效评价过程中的评价标准问题，提出了一种基于基准分析的敏捷供应链绩效评价过程框架结构。该过程框架包括敏捷供应链内部基准库和外部基准库的建立。针对敏捷供应链绩效评价中复杂、多层的评价指标体系，在原型系统中结合使用了层次分析法和模糊综合评价法。应用表明，该评价过程框架很好地解决了敏捷供应链整体绩效评价问题。     

语义Web服务在业务协同与供应链集成中的应用

在面向服务架构中,Web服务组件由于不具有语义特征,难于在供应链的业务协同中实现流程的自动编排。通过引入领域本体,提出了一种基于语义Web服务的供应链协同和集成框架,讨论了语义Web服务的过程以及服务匹配和组合算法,并以物流服务为例说明了业务协作流程的自动组合过程。结果表明,语义Web服务在面向服务的供应链集成中具有流程自动化合成和灵活重构的敏捷性特点。