Title: Using the analytic hierarchy process to design supply chains based on demand uncertainty and implied resource requirements

Authors: Reza Khorramshahgol; Mohammad Askar Saoud

Addresses: Department of Information Systems and Operations Management, College of Business Administration, Kuwait University, Kuwait ' Department of Information Systems and Operations Management, College of Business Administration, Kuwait University, Kuwait

Abstract: In today's volatile business environment, a single supply chain (SC) for a firm can be quite risky. The loss resulting from any disruptive operations, in a case with a single SC, can be much higher than costs of having a few resilient supply chains. For a firm to provide its customers with the desired responsiveness, a few supply chains should be developed. However, due to scarcity of resources, it would be impossible to indiscriminately provide top quality service to all customers. This study uses the Delphi method and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to rank a firm's customers and to determine the implied resource requirements to fulfil customer orders. Using this information, a customer priority index (CPI) matrix is constructed. The CPI matrix is subsequently divided into four quadrants and for each quadrant, a unique SC strategy is formulated, considering the customer's importance and degree of scarcity of resources.

Keywords: implied resource requirement; customer ranking; AHP; Delphi method; customer priority index; CPI.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSCIM.2021.114745

International Journal of Supply Chain and Inventory Management, 2021 Vol.4 No.1, pp.59 - 80

Received: 07 Aug 2019
Accepted: 22 Jul 2020
Published online: 04 May 2021 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article