Decentralized production–distribution planning in multi-echelon supply chain network using intelligent agents

The difference between integrated supply chain and decentralized supply chain is that in integrated supply chain, all the channel partners i.e., suppliers, manufacturers, transport providers, warehouse owners Will cooperate with each other and share the information on costs, capacities etc., to other partners with a view to reduce the overall supply chain cost. In decentralized supply chains, the channel partners will not share information with other partners for fear of distrust, losing their grip in their own domain. In decentralized supply chain systems, each entity (manufacturers, transporters etc.) is modeled as autonomous agent. Each autonomous agent has an objective and a set of constraints. All agents working together will develop feasible plans which are acceptable to all entities. In this paper a “Decentralized production–distribution planning in multi-echelon supply chain network using intelligent agents” model has been proposed and validated.