Automating Supplier Selection Procedures: Methodology, Optimal Tools, and Implementation Techniques

This book describes a methodology for automating supplier selection procedures of small and medium- sized agile virtual enterprises. Firstly, a modeling approach is given that divides the supplier selection procedures broadly into three stages, the pre-selection, selection, and post- selection stages. Then the methodology identifies the steps within the selection stage that can be automated. The methodology also proposes three modules for automating the selection stage. To assist automation, the selection stage is further divided into three sub-stages, namely, bidder selection, partner selection and performance evaluation sub- stages. By this methodology, each sub-stage of the selection stage employs a module for automation: the data collection system for automating on-site selection sub-stage, the inference engine for selecting the best supplier from a list of potential suppliers, and the performance evaluation engine for performance evaluation of the supplier that is selected as the best supplier by the inference engine.