Multi-agent models to study the robustness and resilience of complex supply chain networks

Increase in the rate of disruptive events in the recent times and their economic implications on business continuity have raised the attention in supply chain disruption research. Effective strategic planning during disruptions can be accomplished by assessing the robustness and resilience of the existing supply chain network. This talk will illustrate the application of multi-agent approach at modeling supply chain network as complex adaptive systems and investigating the supply chain network's structural characteristics via social network analysis. The proposed approach provides a better opportunity to achieve our objective - to understand the emergence of complex supply chain networks, assess the network vulnerability after its emergence and study the robustness, resilience of the network to hypothetical internal/external disruptive scenarios. Also, the intelligence of the associated entities, their decision making's influence on the network's emergance, its productivity and its structural characteristics at the network level will be addressed. Supply chain disruption management researchers can use the proposed approach to evaluate the robustness of their network and assess its resilience for varying degrees of disruptions.