International Journal of Industrial Engineering & Production Research

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In the evaluation of non-efficient units by Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) referenced Decision Making Units (DMU’s) have an important role. Unfortunately DMU’s with extra ordinary output can lead to a monopoly in a reference set, the fact called abnormality due to the outliers' data. In this paper, we introduce a DEA model for evaluating DMU’s under this circumstance. The layer model can result in a ranking for DMU’s and obtain an improving strategy leading to a better layer.

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  Supplier selection is one of the most important activities of purchasing departments. This importance is increased even more by new strategies in a supply chain, because of the key role suppliers perform in terms of quality, costs and services which affect the outcome in the buyer’s company. Supplier selection is a multiple criteria decision making problem in which the objectives are not equally important. In practice, vagueness and imprecision of the goals, constraints and parameters in this problem make the decision making complicated. Simultaneously, in this model, vagueness of input data and varying importance of criteria are considered. In real cases, where Decision- Makers (DMs) face up to uncertain data and situations, the proposed model can help DMs to find out the appropriate ordering from each supplier, and allows purchasing manager(s) to manage supply chain performance on cost, quality, on time delivery, etc. An additive weighted model is presented for fuzzy multi objective supplier selection problem with fuzzy weights. The model is explained by an illustrative example.

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Planning and design procedure of an open pit mining project just can be started after ultimate pit determination. In the carried out study in this paper it was shown that the most important factor in ultimate pit determination and in consequence in the whole planning and design procedure of an open pit mine is the metal price. Metal price fluctuations in recent years were exaggerated and imposed a high degree of uncertainty to the mine planning procedure while none of the existent algorithms of the pit limit determination consider the metal price uncertainty. Real Option Approach (ROA) is an efficient method of decision making in the condition of uncertainty. This approach usually used for evaluation of defined natural resources projects up to now. This study considering the metal price uncertainty used real option approach to prepare a methodology for determining the Ultimate Pit Limits (UPL). The study was carried out on a non-ferrous metallic cylindrical ore deposit but the achieved methodology can be adjusted for all kinds of the deposits. The achieved methodology was comprehensively described through the examples in a way that can be used by the mine planners.

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Assessment and selection of suppliers are two most important tasks in the purchasing part in supply chain management. Supplier selection can be considered to be a single or multi-objective problem. From another point of view, it can be a single or multi-sourcing problem. In this paper, an integrated AHP and Fuzzy TOPSIS model is proposed to solve the supplier selection problem. This model makes the decision-maker to be able to solve this problem with different criteria and different weight for each criterion with respect to the purchasing strategy. Finally, the proposed model is illustrated by an example.

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  A data envelopment analysis (DEA) method can be regarded as a useful management tool to evaluate decision making units (DMUs) using multiple inputs and outputs. In some cases, we face with imprecise inputs and outputs, such as fuzzy or interval data, so the efficiency of DMUs will not be exact. Most researchers have been interested in getting efficiency and ranking DMUs recently. Models of the traditional DEA cannot provide a completely ranking of efficient units however, it can just distinguish between efficient and inefficient units. In this paper, the efficiency scores of DMUs are computed by a fuzzy CCR model and the fuzzy entropy of DMUs. Then these units are ranked and compared with two foregoing procedures. To do this, the fuzzy entropy based on common set of weights (CSW) is used. Furthermore, the fuzzy efficiency of DMUs considering the optimistic level is computed. Finally, a numerical example taken from a real-case study is considered and the related concept is analyzed.

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  In this paper flexible job-shop scheduling problem (FJSP) is studied in the case of optimizing different contradictory objectives consisting of: (1) minimizing makespan, (2) minimizing total workload, and (3) minimizing workload of the most loaded machine. As the problem belongs to the class of NP-Hard problems, a new hybrid genetic algorithm is proposed to obtain a large set of Pareto-optimal solutions in a reasonable run time. The algorithm utilizes from a local search heuristic for improving the chance of obtaining more number of global Pareto-optimal solutions. The solution method uses from a perturbed global criterion function for guiding the search direction of the hybrid algorithm. Computational experiences show that the hybrid algorithm has superior performance in contrast to previous studies .

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Supplier selection,   Multi-objective decision making,   Fuzzy Compromise programming,   Supply chain management,   Quantity discount .

Supplier selection is naturally a complex multi-objective problem including both quantitative and qualitative factors. This paper deals with this issue from a new view point. A quantity discount situation, which plays a role of motivator for buyer, is considered. Moreover, in order to find a reasonable compromise solution for this problem, at first a multi-objective modeling is presented. Then a proposed fuzzy compromise programming is utilized to determine marginal utility function for each criterion. Also, group decision makers’ preferences have taken into account and the weight of each criterion has been measured by forming pair-wise comparison matrixes. Finally the proposed approach is conducted for a numerical example and its efficacy and efficiency are verified via this section. The results indicate that the proposed method expedites the generation of compromise solution .

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One of the main principles of the passive defense is the principle of site selection. In this paper, we propose a multiple objective nonlinear programming model that considers the principle of the site selection in terms of two qualitative and quantitative aspects. The purpose of the proposed model is selection of the place of facilities of a system in which not only it observes the dispersion principle but also reduces the system transportation costs. Moreover, the proposed model tries to select the sites that can fulfill other elements of site selection as well as dispersion in a way that it increases the trustworthiness of the selected network .

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An interactive heuristic approach can offer a practical solution to the problem of linear integer programming (LIP) by combining an optimization technique with the Decision Maker’s (DM) judgment and technical supervision. This is made possible using the concept of bicriterion linear programming (BLP) problem in an integer environment. This model proposes two bicriterion linear programs for identifying a feasible solution point when an initial infeasible solution point is provided by the decision maker or when the searching process leaves the region of feasibility seeking for a better pattern to improve the objective function. Instructions regarding the structure of such BLP problems are broadly discussed. This added property offers a great degree of flexibility to the decision making problem solving process.

The heuristic engine is comprised of four algorithms: Improve, Feasible, Leave, and Backtrack. In each iteration, when a selected algorithm has been terminated, the DM is presented with the results and asked to reevaluate the solution process by choosing an appropriate algorithm to follow. It is shown that the method converges to the optimal solution for most of the time. A solution technique for solving such a problem is introduced with sufficient details.

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Implementation of the risk management concepts into construction practice may enhance the performance of project by taking appropriate response actions against identified risks. This research proposes a multi-criteria group decision making approach for the evaluation of different alternative response scenarios. To take into account the uncertainties inherent in evaluation process, fuzzy logic is integrated into the revaluation process. To evaluate alternative response scenarios, first the collective group weight of each criterion is calculated considering opinions of a group consisted of five experts. As each expert has its own ideas, attitudes, knowledge and personalities, different experts will give their preferences in different ways. Fuzzy preference relations are used to unify the opinions of different experts. After computation of collective weights, the best alternative response scenario is selected by the use of proposed fuzzy group decision making methodology which aggregates opinions of different experts. To evaluate the performance of the proposed methodology, it is implemented in a real project and the best alternative responses scenario is selected for one of the identified risks.

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Considering the major change occurred in business cells from plant to “chain” and the critical need to choose the best partners to form the supply chain for competing in today’s business setting, one of the vital decisions made at the early steps of constructing a business is supplier selection. Given the fact that the early decisions are inherently strategic and therefore hard and costly to change, it’s been a point of consideration for industries to select the right supplier. It’s clear that different criteria must be investigated and interfered in deciding on the best partner(s) among the alternatives. Thereupon the problem might be regarded as a multiple criteria decision making (MCDM) problem. There are a variety of techniques to solve a MCDM problem. In this paper we propose a novel technique by combination of decision making trial and evaluation laboratory and graph theory and matrix approach techniques. Eventually, the results are compared to SAW technique and discussed to come to a conclusion.

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In today’s competitive business situation, performance evaluation of firms is an extremely important concern of all the people who are typically stakeholders of the business game. In case of holding companies, this is a more important issue since the parent firm must permanently control the situation of its subsidiaries in their sectors to make appropriate investment decisions. This paper develops a multicriteria decision making (MCDM) approach for evaluating performance of firms considering financial and productivity criteria.. We adopt Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) method to determine the relative importance of evaluation criteria, taking the vagueness and imprecision of human judgments into consideration. Then, we employ the Preference Ranking Organization METHod for Enrichment Evaluation (PROMETHEE) for ranking of firms. Afterward, this paper enjoys benefit of using Technique of Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) to assess the validity of the obtained ranking results. Our approach was applied to a holding company listed in Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) as a real case. The analysis of ranking results revealed advantages of combining these MCDM methods.

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In most of the multi–criteria decision–analysis (MCDA) problems in which the Choquet integral is used as aggregation function, the coefficients of Choquet integral (capacity) are not known in advance. Actually, they could be calculated by capacity definition methods. In these methods, the preference information of decision maker (DM) is used to constitute a possible solution space. The methods which are based on optimizing an objective function most often suffer from three drawbacks. Firstly, the selection of the ultimate solution from solution set is arbitrarily done. Secondly, the solution may provide more information than whatever proposed by DM. Thirdly, DM may not fully interpret the results. Robust capacity definition methods are proposed to overcome these kinds of drawbacks, on the other hand these methods do not consider evenness (uniformity) which is a major property of capacity. Since in capacity definition methods, the preference information on only a subset of alternatives called reference alternatives, is used, defining the capacity as uniform as possible could improve its capability in evaluating non–reference alternatives. This paper proposes an algorithm to define a capacity that is based only on the preference information of DM and consequently is representative. Furthermore, it improves evenness of capacity and consequently its reliability in evaluating non–reference alternatives. The algorithm is used to evaluate power plant projects. Power plant projects are of the most important national projects in Iran and a major portion of national capital is invested on them, so these projects should be scientifically evaluated in order to figure out their performance. Case–specific criteria are considered in addition to general criteria used in project performance evaluation. The evaluation results obtained from proposed algorithm are compared with those of the most representative utility function method.

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Due to the particular importance of projects in human life and in organizations, proper project management has been always regarded highly by researchers and practitioners. Recent advances in technology and fundamental changes in most scientific areas have affected projects and made their nature and environmental circumstances much more complex than in the past. Fortunately, in recent years, many scholars have recognized the importance of complexity in modern project management and tried to identify its various aspects. Furthermore, one of the main factors for a project’s success is the assignment of an appropriate project manager. Many studies have been done about project managers' competencies and the selection methods of a suitable project manager. In most of these researches, the amount and type of project complexity have been explained as influential factors for determining the competent project manager. However, a specific approach for project manager selection considering the complexity of projects is not provided yet. Hence, in this paper we try to design and implement a fuzzy group decision making approach to allocate the best project manager taking into account the project complexity. Also, owing to the importance of construction projects in the development of countries' basic infrastructures, we exclusively studied this kind of projects. Finally, it should be noted that from the viewpoint of complexity theory, system complexity can exist in two forms: static and dynamic. Therefore, considering the breadth of issues related to each of these two complexity areas, just the static complexity of construction projects has been studied here.

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Nowadays, with a growing body of features and technologies, supply chain management is being widely used to coordinate and optimize key processes such as increasing customer satisfaction, facilitating the processes, and enhancing product quality. In recent years, the emergence of IT and new business environments has led to the development of electronic supply chains. In order to use and benefit from the privileges of e-supply chains, organizations must identify the key factors in the implementation of e-supply chain management so that they can monitor the organization's current and future activities and take action to identify and modify and fix any bugs. The present study aimed at identifying these factors. Based on the available theoretical foundations and expert opinions, the factors affecting the implementation of electronic supply chain management were identified in seven factors with 31 indicators. To determine the weight of the identified factors considering the lack of independence between them, an integrated type-2 fuzzy AHP and type-2 fuzzy DEMATEL approach was used. Results showed that computer-based technology, infrastructure, inter-organizational relationships, and information are the most important factors.

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Regarding population growth and prompt development in developing countries, municipal solid waste management is always a great challenge for governments. Waste to energy conversion is an efficient approach with respect to overcoming not only the challenge of municipal solid waste management but also environmental challenges related to energy consumption like global warming and fossil fuel depletion. One of the substantial problems throughout the implementation of waste to energy approach is process selection. The selected process should be technically feasible and should have a high level of compliance with environmental standards. Owing to an inevitable significance of process selection, this paper focuses on defining the best process by relying on multi-criteria decision-making tools and network analytic process. Considering the effective parameters such as cost, efficiency in material diversity, productivity rate, energy consumption, pollutant emissions, toxic substances, and process time, the result indicates that the physico-chemical process is superior process for pretreatment of material.

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Today due to the globalization and competitive conditions of the market, decisions are generally made in group and in accordance with different attributes. In addition, all of the information is associated with uncertainty. In such situation, the emergence of inconsistency and facing with the contradictions will be obvious. Having regarded this fact, the development and application of tools that adequately address the uncertainty in decision making process and also be appropriate for group decision making is an important area of multi-criteria decision making (MCDM). Therefore, in this paper, firstly we developed the traditional best-worst method (BWM) and proposed an interval-valued intuitionistic fuzzy best-worst method (IVIFBWM), then introduced a novel approach for fuzzy multi-attribute group decision making based on the proposed method. Finally, in order to demonstrate how the introduced approach can be applied in practice, it is implemented in an Iranian investment company and the experimental results are examined. From the experimental results, we can extract that not only the introduced approach is simple in calculation but also it is convenient in implementation especially in interval-valued intuitionistic fuzzy environments.

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In today’s world, manufacturing companies are required to integrate their sources with manufacturing systems and use novel technologies in order to survive in the competitive world market. In this context, computer integrated manufacturing (CIM) and its related technologies are taken as novel and efficient schemes; therefore, selecting the best technology among them has been a challenging issue. Such an investment decision is, in nature, a multi-attribute problem. In fact, manufacturing technologies have various advantages and disadvantages which need to be considered in order to choose the best one. In this paper, we briefly study the structure and goals of computer integrated manufacturing systems, the role of different sectors in traditional and modern manufacturing systems, and the effect of information communication on them. Then, various options regarding the implementation of an integrated computer manufacturing technology are introduced and a  combined model of the fuzzy analytical hierarchy process and fuzzy TOPSIS is proposed to handle the above-mentioned multiple criteria decision making problem. Finally, the considered options for manufacturing technologies are ranked using a numerical example.
 

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Due to the intensity of competition and economical condition in different countries, a group of manufacturers tried to add new products in their product portfolios in order to gain superiority against their competitors. However, the strategy and the manner of adding the products to the portfolio is one of the biggest challenges in the manufacturing process. As a result, researchers have used a variety of methods to evaluate the alternatives, such as ranking, mathematical optimization and multi criteria decision making. Hybrid methods using multi criteria decision making have gained popularity in recent years. This article uses a novel hybrid strategy using multi criteria decision making in order to find the best alternative. It is concluded that the ‘making’ alternative is superior to joint venturing and buying alternatives using the net outranking flow index.

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The role of sustainability dimensions in the value creation process has received much attention. Adopting a proper set of key performance indicators sustainability leads to accurate calculation of chain value. This paper focuses on the dimensions of in the biofuel supply chain and seeks to evaluate the value in the chain. First, the importance of biofuels and its various types are discussed. Then, a new model is presented by designing the proposed energy chain and considering its sustainability dimensions and indicators in uncertain environment. Rough set theory is one of the best mathematical tools for dealing with uncertainty. The proposed biofuel energy supply chain is modeled to obtain the total value of the system considering sustainability indicators and layers of the supply chain. A multi-objective rough mathematical formulation is presented and solved. Best-worst method was integrated to determine the significance score of sustainability indicators. Finally, the model of the rough linear mathematical program is solved with optimization tools and the sustainable value of the chain is obtained.