Research On Postponed Production Optimization For Two-stage Supply Chain In Mass Customization

In the current market economy are experiencing a high speed development, product are gradually showing the characteristic of short circulation, individuation and huge fluctuations. It is urgent to deal with the conflict between a limited supply capacity and market fluctuation. Through postpone in time and space while producing, postponed production can delay the customized product until receiving order from customer. It can finish customized products’manufacturing and delivery according to customer’s order in short time. By effectively reduce the effect of the Contradiction role on the manufacturer or even the whole supply chain, postponed production is an available method to achieve mass customization. In such situation, establishment of mass customization postpone system with high efficient is catching widespread concern and depth study in both business community and academic area. The key issue for establish a high efficient postpone system is its optimize decision and whether this can bring the reduction in cost for enterprises. To solve this problem, this paper studies the following issues from the view of manufacturer and retail:It studies the optimal cost and the customer order decoupling point of manufacturer and supply chain in both traditional environment and mass customization environment, on the basis of it, this paper studies the factors that may influence the customer order decoupling point.First of all, this paper analyzes the manufacturing system for both traditional environment and mass customization environment, the optimization of cost and time can be found by optimizing the locate of the customer order decoupling point. After considering these two optimization objective conditions, it establishes the basic manufacturing model and queuing theory model for both traditional environment and mass customization environment, and compares the optimal cost for these two kinds of manufacturing system. Results are found that if manufacturer couldn’t choose the right locate of the customer order decoupling point, it may increase the cost of manufacturer.Then, on the basis of previous study, the thesis expands the objective of this study from manufacturer to supply chain which contains manufacturer and retailer, mainly discusses and compares the cost optimization in both traditional environment and mass customization environment. By taking retailer’s ordering cost into consideration, it establishes cost optimization for traditional environment; on the other hand basic manufacturing model and queuing theory model of supply chain are proposed for mass customization environment. Then the ordering strategy, location of the customer order decoupling point and it influence are discussed while the supply chain is in optimal situation. Results are found that in traditional environment, retailer’s ordering strategy has relatively huge influence on total cost of supply chain, while in mass customization environment, the locate of customer order decoupling point shows a significant role. When making postpone decision, enterprises in supply chain should fully consider the optimal cost for both production environment, and make right decision after comparing.