Supplier selection and evaluation models for a design change scheme in collaborative manufacturing environment

A design change is commonly applied to change a portion of an existing product for the purpose of adding some functional values or reducing certain costs. In a global supply chain, a design change not only changes a portion of a product, but also changes the selection of suppliers. Therefore, it is important to evaluate a design change and its effect on the selection of suppliers in a collaborative manufacturing environment. In this research, a fuzzy analytic hierarchy process evaluation model is presented for evaluating the different design change alternative cases. First, a component relational matrix is modeled. If an initial component change is made, the other components that are affected by the initial component are identified and represented using a component relational matrix. A component relational matrix is used to obtain the relational values of the relational factors for the different suppliers. Second, a fuzzy analytic hierarchy process evaluation method is presented to establish the hierarchy of the indices and analyze the final total relational values of the relational factors for the different suppliers. The total relational values are compared to select the most suitable suppliers. Implementation and test results of a mobile example product are presented.