Developing a Bi-objective Model for Locating and Allocating Decisions in a Three-echelon Supply Chain

Supply chain management is one of the fundamental issues facing organizations. In this research, a model for decisions to locate facilities and distribution networks is presented in order to minimize both the cost and time in a three echelon supply chain. These objectives include costs of setup, ordering, purchasing, manufacturing, transportation, shipping and receiving and production time. The proposed model is a mixed-integer nonlinear programming that determines proper locations to setup facilities. CPLEX optimization tool, Genetic Algorithms and Simulated Annealing are used to solve the model. Finally, to examine and measure the effectiveness of problem-solving methods, computational results are compared using some statistical analysis.