Title: Integrated analysis of supply chain structure design and adaptation potential in an agile environment

Authors: Alexander Arkhipov, Dmitry Ivanov

Addresses: Department of Economics, Chair of Management, St. Petersburg State University of Technology and Design, 191186 St. Petersburg, Russia. ' Department of Production Management and Industrial Sciences, Chemnitz University of Technology, 09126 Chemnitz, Germany

Abstract: In this study, we extend the existing approaches to Supply Chain (SC) design based on the assessment of a SC|s potential ability to adapt structurally in an agile environment. We determine a new metric, |SC adaptation potential|, and propose a method for its assessment based on the system entropy. This makes it possible to integrate the analysis of SC structure complexity and adaptability. Consequently, we consider the usage of adaptation potential for SC structuring. The adaptation potential can be used as an additional indicator to select a SC configuration. The analysis of adaptation potential makes it possible to take the decisions on the determination of a number of elements in a SC, their variety, and the interrelations between them with regard to the potential ability SC to adapt SC structurally in order to ensure flexibility and resilience.

Keywords: supply chain design; structural complexity; adaptation potential; dynamic programming; agile environments; system entropy; supply chain structuring; supply chain configurations; flexibility; resilience; integrated supply chains; SCM; supply chain management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJISM.2011.040714

International Journal of Integrated Supply Management, 2011 Vol.6 No.2, pp.165 - 180

Published online: 17 Jun 2011 *

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