Leagile and sustainable supplier selection problem in the Industry 4.0 era: a case study of the medical devices using hybrid multi-criteria decision making tool

Abstract

Given the crucial role of the supplier selection problem (SSP) in today’s competitive business environment, the present study investigates the SSP by considering the leagile, sustainability, and Industry 4.0 (I4.0) indicators for the medical devices industry (MDI). In this regard, at the outset, the list of criteria and sub-criteria is provided based on the literature and experts’ opinions. Then, the importance of the indicators is measured utilizing the rough best–worst method (RBWM). In the next step, the potential suppliers are ranked employing the multi-attributive border approximation area comparison (IR-MABAC) method. Due to the crucial role of medical devices during the COVID-19 outbreak, the present work selects a project-based organization in this industry as a case study. The obtained results show that agility and sustainability are the most important criteria, and manufacturing flexibility, cost, reliability, smart factory, and quality are the most important sub-criteria. The main theoretical contributions of this study are considering the leagile, sustainability, and I4.0 criteria in the SSP and employing the hybrid RBWM-IR-MABAC method in this area for the first time. On the other side, The results of this research can help supply chain managers to become more familiar with the sustainability, agility, leanness, and I4.0 criteria in the business environment.

Leveraging Industry 4.0 Technologies for Sustainable Humanitarian Supply Chains: Evidence from the Extant Literature

“…So far, I4.0 applications have been primarily focused on commercial supply chains, and with this paper, we assert the need for I4.0 frameworks to be engaged in HSCs. For instance, a case study related to the supplier selection process for acquiring medical devices [92] could be studied in the context of HSCs. Non-governmental organizations such as the Red Cross or Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) [93] can benefit from BDA to predict disease outbreaks and plan their medical SCs.…”

Project portfolio selection considering the hindrance to risk propagation: a dual-objective optimization approach

“…In a competitive economy environment, the problem of how to determine an appropriate investment allocation of limited resources to select low-risk and high-benefit set of projects is called project portfolio selection (PPS) problem, which is crucial for a/an company/organization (Boyd et al, 2017;ForouzeshNejad, 2023;Kolm et al, 2014). However, risks triggered by multiple uncertainties, such as resource shortages (Afzal et al, 2023;Bai et al, 2020), organizational instability (Mahmoudi et al, 2022), etc., can seriously affect the realization of project benefits, so the problem of PPS considering risks has been widely concerned (Asadabadi & Zwikael, 2021;Hofman et al, 2018;Suresh & Dillibabu, 2020;X.…”

Supplier selection using the integrated MEREC – CoCoSo methods in a medical device company

“…In his study conducted in 2023, Forouzeshnejad concluded that agility and sustainability are the essential criteria for agility and sustainability in the medical device industry and that flexibility, cost, reliability, smart factory, and quality are crucial criteria determined subsequently [17].…”