Decisions related to acceptance or rejection of orders play an important role in companies engaged in make-to-order production. The incoming orders have a specific delivery date by which the customer expects the due date to be met and the order delivered. In some cases the level of input orders exceeds beyond the existing capacity. In such situations the main concern is to decide which orders must be accepted and which ones rejected taking into account the available production capacity. This paper prioritises the input orders according to a comprehensive and systematic multi criteria decision making (MCDM) model. It then proceeds with making decisions to either accept or reject orders according to the calculated prioritises and production constraints. Ultimately the optimum list of orders for acceptance is determined. The proposed model is a combination of two techniques of Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process (FAHP) and Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to an Ideal Solution (TOPSIS). In this model FAHP is used to determine the weights of criteria and TOPSIS is used for prioritizing the orders. Finally the proposed model is tested for its efficiency by application to a real case.

Food supply chain disruptions have of recent increased in terms of severity and frequency leading to viability problems for most businesses in related supply chain networks and hunger among millions of human beings. In the extant supply chain literature elements of responsive supply chain such as velocity, versatility, and visibility have been suggested as some of the possible strategies to build supply chain resilience. It has therefore been suggested in this study that these elements’ influence on supply chain resilience is moderated by contract farming as a special form of supplier development. Farming contracts are either production or marketing contracts. Data was collected from a conveniently selected sample of 200 restaurants that use supplier development in the form of contract farming for acquiring critical resources for their operations. A structural equation modelling was used to analyse data related to the direct effects and multi group structural equation modelling was used to assess the moderating effects. The results revealed that there is a statistically significant relationship between the three selected elements of responsive supply chain management and supply chain resilience, and all the hypothesised relationships were moderated by type of farming contracts, with the relationships being stronger under marketing contracts for supply chain velocity, and under production contracts than under marketing contracts for relationships involving versatility and visibility. Therefore, the study recommended that production contracts be used in the fast-food restaurant industry in order to reduce supply chain vulnerabilities, and marketing contracts to build supply chain capabilities. This is the first study that has sought to assess the differential utility of different farming contracts through assessing their moderating effects as a build-up on previous research that has already established that supplier development in the form of contract farming leads to supplier development.

Decision-making process is an integral part of every sporting event across the globe. This process uses inputs from single to multi-decision makers. To make a sporting event a success, appropriate decision making needs to be made starting from hosting-right to the end of the event. Thus, this study presents a framework that scientifically determines the hosting-right for a sporting event. The framework is based on techno-economic analysis of potential hosting locations for a sporting event. Techno-economic criteria are analysed using fuzzy TOPSIS (technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution) method. The analysis of the hosting-right is also performed through technical, economic, techno-economic and cost-benefit ratio perspectives. A case study of national sports festival in Nigeria is used to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed framework. Twelve technical and eight economic criteria are considered in the proposed framework. Six loca-tions are considered during the implementation of the proposed framework. The results obtained show that the issue of hosting-right award depends on the evaluation criteria that are considered by decision-makers.

Nowadays, projects have become so widespread in the world that individuals and organizations are always involved in a variety of them. Recent advances in technology and fundamental chang-es in most scientific disciplines have had an essential impact on projects, and have made the na-ture and environmental conditions governing them to become more complex than before. With increasing complexity, the amount of information needed for project management increases. In general, the increasing complexity of projects is a growing source of project risks. It has been recognized that complexity affects the performance of a project and will be effective in its suc-cess. In this context, the traditional principles and practices of project management are no longer able to control the emerging complexity of projects. In addition, one of the key factors for the success of the projects is the appropriateness of the project manager's assignment. Many studies have been carried out in identifying the suitability criteria of the project manager and the methods of selecting the project manager. In most of these studies, the amount and type of complexity of the project are mentioned as factors influencing the design of an appropriate project manager. However, there has not yet been a specific approach for selecting the project manager with re-gard to the complexity of the project. Therefore, in this research, we try to investigate the rela-tionship between the complexity of the project and the merits of the project manager by applying a structural equation modeling approach.

Privatization means establishing a new system based on the market mechanisms and consequently making a change, alteration in different aspects of economy and is a process in which the government can examine the possibility of transferring the duties and facilities to the private sector on any level and if necessary, exerts such transfer. On the other hand, exports in industry sector can be a noticeable point for the economic growth of any country. Enhancing the exports of the steel industry of the country can have a principal role in the economic pursuit of the country’s non-oil products. Such an enhancement brings about a positive effect in the efficiency of the stocks within the financial markets by developing the steel industry. Researchers of this field claim that privatization in the steel industry results in the further development of the steel stock market and exports. This paper presents a comprehensive survey on factors influencing on privatization of the firms in steel industry. The study has designed a questionnaire in Likert scale and distributed it among some experts who worked for Mobarakeh steel producer in Iran. Using principle component analysis, the survey has concluded that export activities were influenced the most by six major factors including creativity, technological limitation, opportunities and challenges, being up to date, customer orientation and financial sanction. Moreover, firm performance was influenced by two major factors of stakeholder’s satisfaction and organizational culture. Finally, two factors of rationalism and market orientation influenced the most on privatization.

Over the past decades, high entropy alloys (HEAs) have attracted continuously increasing research efforts because of their technological promise for structural applications and their scientific interest as a multi-component alloy exhibiting an overall random solid solution structure with high mixing entropy at high temperature. In this summary, we briefly review the recent studies focused on the structure and mechanical behavior of HEAs, covering the important issues from phase stability to elastic modulus, mechanical strength, hardness and fatigue resistance. Finally, we highlight a few key findings recently reported for HEAs and discuss the outstanding issues yet to be resolved.

Supply chain management (SCM) has recently received considerable attention in business management literature. Many companies consider a well-designed SCM and implement it to their systems to increase the performance of production systems. Supplier selection is a fundamental aspect of SCM, which heavily contributes to the overall supply chain performance. SCM is a complicated decision-making problem including both quantitative and qualitative factors. In this paper, we try to determine criteria, indicated by experts for selection of suitable suppliers. The proposed study obtains weight of each criterion by Fuzzy Linear Goal Programming (FLGP) technique. We rank the suppliers by Fuzzy Quality Function Deployment (FQFD) method. The study is executed for a PETROCHEMICAL Co. to evaluate and select the best suppliers.

The title compound 3-amino-5-(4-chlorophenyl)pyridazine-4-carbonitrile was prepared by a one-pot three-component reaction of malononitrile with corresponding arylglyoxal in the presence of hydrazine hydrate at room temperature in water and ethanol. Its structure was also con?rmed by its IR, 1H, 13C-NMR, Mass spectral data and elemental analysis. The compound was crystallized in the monoclinic system, space group P21/c, a = 3.817(3) ?, b = 13.533(10) ?, c = 19.607(15) ?, B = 93.401(10)°, Z=4, R1 = 0.0906 and wR2 = 0.1422. The crystal structure of the compound also shows a weak intermolecular interaction between N1 atom of one molecule and N3 atom of the other molecule.

The present paper is aimed at multi-objective scheduling in an agent based holonic manufacturing system to satisfy the goal of several communities namely the product, the resource, and the organization simultaneously. In this attempt, first a multi criteria based priority rule is developed following Simple Additive Weight (SAW) method under Multi Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) environment to rank the products. Accordingly, the products are allowed to select a particular resource for execution by negotiation considering minimum time as criterion. The interests of different communities are accomplished by allocating the ordered rank of products to the ordered rank of resources. Conflict, if arises between products and resources, are resolved by introducing the concept of Early Finish Time (EFT) as criterion for task allocation. A scheduling algorithm is proposed for execution of the rule. In view of machine failure, a cooperation strategy is evolved that also optimizes reallocation of the incomplete task. It is concluded that the proposed scheduling algorithm together with the disturbance handling algorithm are poised to satisfy the agent’s local objective as well as organization’s global objective concurrently and are commensurable with multi agent paradigm.

Automation in service delivery has increased the consumers’ expectation with regard to service quality and subsequently the perception of the same. Technology-driven services redefined quality dimensions and their subsequent impact on the behavioural outcomes of the consumers with specific reference to attitudinal loyalty and propensity to switch. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) has further reinforced the operational aspects of a service provider by integrating the behavioural perspectives with technology. This paper attempts to explore the nomological link between automated service quality and its behavioural consequences with specific reference to consumers’ attitudinal loyalty and their intention to switch or defect from their present service provider. The study further takes into consideration the moderating effects of the performance of the dimensions and attributes of customer relationship management by introducing a novel approach to CRM performance indexing. The cross-sectional study was carried out with the customers of State Bank of India at Asansol, Durgapur, Bolpur and Santiniketan in West Bengal, India. The study used structural equation modeling (SEM) to assess and validate the nomological relationship between the variables.