European J. of Industrial Engineering (10 papers in press)

Regular Issues

• The impact of online sales in centralized and decentralized dual-channel supply chains  
  by Subrata Saha 
  Abstract: This paper studies a supply chain structure featuring two different types of distribution channels through which manufacturers sell products. The centralised and decentralised distribution channels considered in this study are affected by online sales outside the structured channels. In the centralised distribution channel, two retail stores located in geographically distinct markets are operated by a single owner. In the decentralised distribution channel, two retailers independently operate two retail stores. In the non-cooperative scenario, the manufacturer always prefers the decentralised distribution channel irrespective of whether an online channel is used. To achieve channel coordination, a revenue-sharing contract is applied, but it can be used to coordinate only the decentralised distribution system. Therefore, a modified revenue-sharing contract is proposed to coordinate the centralised distribution system. The analytical study reveals that without coordination among the channel members, the manufacturer always earns maximum profit in decentralised distribution systems. However, if the supply chain is coordinated, then the manufacturer receives more benefits from using the centralised distribution systems under certain conditions. Propositions are presented to describe the characteristics of distribution structures, and to provide meaningful management guidelines for coordinating them. Extensive numerical investigations are also presented.
  Keywords: Supply chain management; Dual-channel supply chain; Revenue sharing contract; Pricing strategy; Stackelberg.
  DOI: 10.1504/EJIE.2018.10011153
   
  
• Latent semantic extraction and analysis for TRIZ-based inventive design  
  by Yan Wei, Hong Liu, Yusheng Liu, Jihua Wang, Cecilia Zanni-Merk, Denis Cavallucci, Xiaodan Yan, Liang Zhang 
  Abstract: During the development of TRIZ, several knowledge sources have been developed to solve inventive problems. Even though they are about close notions, the level of detail of the descriptions is very dissimilar, making it difficult for the user to operate with them in a systematic way. To cope with this difficulty, we are interested in finding semantic links among these sources, with the goal of assisting the inventive design expert during his activities. Taking into account that all the TRIZ knowledge sources are represented as short texts and directly applying conventional topic models on such short texts may not work well, an extended latent semantic analysis model is proposed to find the missing links among the TRIZ knowledge sources. With the help of these obtained links, several heuristic abstract solutions can be obtained. In order to show this whole process, the resolution of the case of the Auguste Piccards Stratostat is elaborated in detail. [Received: 11 March 2017; Revised: 21 November 2017; Accepted: 30 March 2018]
  Keywords: theory of inventive problem solving; TRIZ; knowledge sources; latent semantic analysis; LSA; semantic weight; term-item semantic matrix; TISM.
  DOI: 10.1504/EJIE.2018.10013866
   
  
• Combining multi-criteria decision analysis and design thinking  
  by Jutta Geldermann, Nils Lerche, Juan David Sepulveda 
  Abstract: Design Thinking (DT) has attracted much attention in management practice as a novel problem-solving methodology. It supports and encourages collaborative creativity to solve problems in a holistically and user-centred way. Although there are similarities between DT and Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA), such as the process orientation and stakeholder participation, there are also differences. Whereas DT mainly focuses on the innovative creation of a prototype, MCDA concentrates instead on the ranking of alternatives. In this paper, we analyse the similarities and differences of DT and MCDA. Based on this analysis, we then develop an approach to integrate elements from DT into MCDA. The stepwise procedure of the adjusted decision process from MCDA is presented in detail. Here, the ap-proach of rapid prototyping from DT is of particular interest. Finally, we discuss the opportunities and challenges of combining multi-criteria decision analysis and design thinking.
  Keywords: Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis; Multi-Criteria Decision Making; Design Thinking Process; Design Thinking Tools; Structured Decision Process; PROMETHEE; IDEO; d.school; Participation; Rapid Prototyping.
  
  
• A Single Product Perishable Inventory System with Compulsory Waiting Period for Reordering and with Stochastic Lead-time  
  by V. S. S. Yadavalli, S. Udayabaskaran 
  Abstract: A continuous review of single product perishable stochastic inventory system is considered in which a reorder can be placed only after the expiry of a compulsory waiting period (CWP) even if the inventory position of the system demands an earlier placement of a reorder. There is a stochastic lead-time for replenishment. The steady-state probability distribution for the inventory level is explicitly found. Performance measures such as stationary mean number of replenishment, mean number of demand satisfied and mean number of demand lost are explicitly found. A numerical illustration is provided to highlight the behavior of performance measures of the model.
  Keywords: stochastic inventory system; perishable item; reorder; compulsory waiting period; lead time.
  
  
• Recognition Performance of Imputed Control Chart Patterns Using Exponentially Weighted Moving Average  
  by Razieh Haghighati, Adnan Hassan 
  Abstract: Performance of control chart pattern recognizer (CCPR) is dependent on the quality of data. Furthermore, when data is partially missing, false alarms and misclassification rate are high. This paper studied CCPR with incomplete data and investigated effectiveness of the exponential smoothing in restoring the patterns aiming to increase the recognition accuracy. The results demonstrated that average overall recognition accuracy degrades from 99.57 (without missingness) to 76.33 in severe missingness. Classification errors in the incomplete random and trend patterns increased up to 38 and 44 times, respectively. Exponential smoothing with a constant of 0.9 is found to be an effective imputation technique. In 50% missingness, recognition accuracy of imputed dataset improved by 99.2% and 19.4% in stable and unstable patterns respectively. Type I error in trend and type II error in random and cyclic patterns were reduced significantly with EWMA imputation. Sensitivity tests proved pattern recognition using proposed imputation technique resulted in superior robustness performance.
  Keywords: control chart; pattern recognition; missing value; imputation; statistical feature; EWMA.
  
  
• A Transshipment Policy for Dynamic Pickup and Delivery Services with Dual Objectives  
  by Katayut Kamano, Yon-Chun Chou 
  Abstract: For pickup and delivery service with multiple couriers, collaboration between couriers through hub transshipment has the potential of improving customer waiting time and courier workload. However, transshipment collaboration calls for postponing the delivery of some jobs to the next time period for the benefit of the greater whole. Therefore, new ideas for mitigating the penalty on those postponed jobs should be further investigated. To this end, this paper presents an analysis of a service policy for two categories of jobs, regular and urgent, under two performance measures for a dynamic environment. For this policy, dominance relationships between routing solutions are derived. A routing method is then developed. Numerical results show that the proposed policy and method is practical in constructing an efficient front in the waiting-time and workload performance space. This paper bridges a methodology gap in applying collaborative hub transshipment to dynamic pickup and delivery services. [Received 28 February 2017; Revised 29 January 2018; Accepted 14 May 2018]
  Keywords: collaborative logistic; hub transshipment; dynamic pickup and delivery; efficient front.
  
  
• Human-machine cooperation in planning and scheduling: a case study on an unstable environment  
  by Zakaria YAHOUNI, Nasser MEBARKI, Farouk BELKADI, Atif SHAHZAD, Alain BERNARD 
  Abstract: In an industrial environment, manufacturing systems may be subject to considerable uncertainties which may lead to numerous schedule disturbances. These disturbances prevent the execution of the planned production schedule. Groups of permutable jobs is one of the most studied methods that deal with this drawback. It constructs a flexible solution characterized by a set of schedules, allowing a human operator to execute, in real-time, the schedule that best fits the state of the shop. However, because of the limited complexity that one human being can handle, he/she needs to cooperate with the machine in order to take efficient decisions. This paper focuses on investigating the human-machine cooperation for planning and scheduling.AnewHuman-Machine Interface model assisted with a multi-indicator Decision Support System has been proposed and evaluated. The results show the usefulness/limits of the proposed model and provide insights into the practice of production planning and scheduling.
  Keywords: Scheduling; Human-machine Interface; Decision support system; Flow shop.
  
  
• Channel Selection for Automotive Parts Remanufacturer under Government Replacement-subsidy  
  by Sun Jianan, Xiao Zhongdong 
  Abstract: This paper considered government replacement-subsidy policy to examine the channel selection of the automotive parts remanufacturer, and we constructed two channel models in which the automotive parts remanufacturer may choose the supplier mode or competitor mode. Due to the relatively low acceptance of remanufactured automotive parts in developing countries such as China, we model the two scenarios with government offering replacement-subsidy to the remanufacturer to incentivize automotive parts remanufacturing activities. Then, we discuss the impacts of the replacement-subsidy policy on the strategy of channel selection by applying a game theory method. We find that the scope of the automotive parts remanufacturers net cost is quite vital, which is decided by the government replacement price, subsidy and costs of the remanufacturer. The subsidy and replacement price to customers have an affirmative influence on the protection of the environment within a specific range..
  Keywords: automotive parts remanufacturing; replacement; government subsidy; channel selection.
  
  
• Impact of pricing and inventory policies with benefit sharing mechanism on supply chain performances  
  by Chatdanai Kaorapapong, Pisal Yenradee 
  Abstract: This paper is to analyse impacts of pricing policies, inventory policies, and benefit sharing mechanism on supply chain (SC) performances. The novelties and theoretical contributions of this paper include a development of linear mathematical functions to represent pricing policies, especially every day low price, and explicitly considering cash as one of the performance measures in addition to profit and revenue. A mix integer linear programing model (MILP) with pricing mechanism and policy constraints is developed. A case study in plastic fashion accessary industry in Thailand is performed. Experiments are conducted to demonstrate how the proposed model is applied. The performance measures are translated into satisfaction levels and plotted in a radar chart to facilitate performance comparison among policies. Practical contribution is that this paper recommends suitable combinations of policies to match with the priority of profit, revenue, and cash performances.
  Keywords: pricing policy; inventory policy; benefit sharing mechanism; supply chain planning; MILP.
  
  
• Examination timetabling problem with scarce resources: a case study  
  by Muhammed Emre Keskin, Alper Döyen, Hasan Akyer, Mehmet Güray Güler 
  Abstract: Examination timetabling problem (ETP) is one of the hardest administrative tasks that has to be undertaken several times at each semester in all faculties. Although the major structure of the problem remains intact, requirements may change from faculty to faculty causing major changes in the solution procedures. The number of academic staff and the level of infrastructures of newly established universities cannot keep up with the increasing number of departments and students in Turkey. This scarcity brings several additional constraints to the ETP. In this study, we propose a two stage solution procedure for the ETP of such universities.We apply our solution method to a real problem, in particular to the final exam scheduling problem of Faculty of Engineering at Pamukkale University.We showthat better feasible solutions can be found in shorter computation times by our method than the feasible solutions found by commercial softwares. Moreover we show that the total examination period length can be reduced from 7 days to 6 days with the proposed method.
  Keywords: Examination Timetabling; Mixed-Integer Programming; Decomposition; Heuristic.