Export plays an essential role for boosting the economy of developing countries. On the other hand, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) are important part of any economy. Therefore, it is important to determine the effects of various factors influencing on development of export activities. This paper presents an empirical investigation to study the effects of customer segmentation factors on the performance of export activities of SMEs in Iranian food industry. The study selects a sample of 227 people who were involved in development of SMEs in city of Tehran, Iran. The study designs a questionnaire in Likert scale consists of 34 questions, Cronbach alpha and KMO are equal to 0.809 and 0.764, respectively, which are well above the desirable levels. Using principal component analysis, the study has determined that different factors including competitive structure, organizational strategy, customer’s studies and organizational factors influencing the most on promoting export activities.

Lean Manufacturing is being adopted by many Indian industries based on its capability of improving manufacturing performance. Lean Manufacturing supports the concept of delivering the low cost and good quality product to customer by focusing on elimination of waste. Lean Manufacturing employs various elements which aspire to involve the employees to create a customer centric organization. This paper is an attempt to examine the significance of various lean manufacturing elements in Indian industries. Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) approach is used to examine their inter-relationship and ranking based on their driving power and dependence powers through development of diagraph and structural model in the Indian industry context.

This paper considers the economic order quantity (EOQ) model over a finite horizon, in which demand rate follows a two-parameter Weibull time-dependent, shortages are allowed and completely backlogged. Mathematical formulations are derived under two different circumstances i.e. case I: The permissible delay is less than or equal time to finish positive inventory for settling the account, and case II: The permissible delay period is greater than time to finish positive inventory for settling the account. Based on the optimal solutions some important results are derived and numerical examples are provided to validate the proposed model. Finally, sensitivity analysis is provided to analyze the effect of changes with the variation in one parameter at a time on the optimal solution.

In this paper, an exploration investigation is presented to determine entrepreneurial marketing factors influencing on small and medium enterprises (SMEs), which are active in Iranian food industry. The study designs a questionnaire consists of 27 questions in Likert scale and distributes it among 249 experts who were involved in in food industry. KMO Bartlett test Sphericity and Cronbach alpha are 0.811 and 0.892, respectively. Using structural equation modeling, the study has determined five factors including innovative approach, flexible marketing, customer, product strategy and resources, which are influencing the most on entrepreneurial marketing factors.

In this paper, a supply chain inventory model is developed in inflationary environment by incorporating some realistic features such as ramp type demand, deterioration, partial backlogging, inflation, and trade credit. Here, rate of deterioration is linear and partial backlogging rate is variable and dependent on the waiting time for the next replenishment. Depending on the trade credit period, three different situations arise. For each model the optimal replenishment policy is determined. Numerical examples are provided to illustrate the proposed inventory model and sensitivity analyses of optimal solutions are given for each case of trapezoidal demand function.

Green supply chain is a new concept in recent literature. The purpose of the study is to identify the importance of different factors related to green practice, performance and pressure during manufacturing in Indian manufacturing industries. The approach of this research includes in depth literature review, experts interviews and questionnaire surveys. The questionnaires are developed and data are collected through mail and two rounds of data collection were carried out to obtain more reliable responses. The major activities of the green supply chain; namely internal environmental management system, green packaging, green purchasing, eco designing, cooperation with customers, internal recovery, environmental, positive economic, negative economic, regulatory, competition are covered throughout the research. Factor analysis is performed using IBM SPSS 21 statistical software to understand the importance of green supply chain. Factor analysis is used to obtain the relative importance of various factors of green practice, green performance, and pressure. The collected data are analyzed by applying “mean score” method and the graphs are designed in SPSS software to compare the different factors.

In this paper, a deterministic inventory model with depletion rate dependent holding cost is developed. The demand rate is a power function of the on-hand inventory behind to a certain stock level, at which the demand rate becomes a constant. Shortages are allowed and partially backlogged with the function of waiting time of next replenishment. It is also proved in this model that the optimal replenishment policy not only exists but also is unique. Furthermore, it is provided a simple solution procedure for finding the maximum total profit per unit time. Numerical examples have also been given to illustrate the model and real managerial fact in inventory holding for stock dependent demand.

This paper presents an empirical investigation to study the effects of retail brand on organizational competitiveness. The study has accomplished among 247 randomly selected retail stores located in city of Tehran, Iran. We have designed a questionnaire in Likert scale and distributed the questionnaires among some managers of retail stores. Bartlett KMO and Cronbach alpha have been calculated as 0.7 and 0.863, respectively, which are within the desirable levels. Using principal component analysis, the study has detected five factors influencing on organizational competitiveness including effective brand, distribution management, customer strategy, retail location and competitive tools. The highest value belongs to retail location (B = 1.196) followed by distribution management (B = 0.825), effective brand (B = 0.47) and competitive tools (B = 0.470).

Organized retailing (OZR) is one of the most promising industries in India. The OZR sector of India is now among the top five fastest growing markets of the world. High population, globalization, and the increasing income of middle class etc. are a number of factors that make Indian market more challenging and competitive. In today’s globalized world, effective supply chain performance (SCP) is highly important to ensure the productivity in the whole supply chain (SC). In this paper, we investigated the factors that affect cold supply chain performance (CSCP) of organized farm products retailing (OFPR), developed and validated a model. This research will be helpful to formulate better strategies for this sector to a greater extent; this model will also be useful and applicable for other developing Asian countries because of enormous similarities in their market tendencies.