Upstream demand projection and performance mapping in supply chains

This paper deals with modeling steady-state behavior of a single-product, pull-type., serial supply chain, frequently encountered in the automotive industries. The proposed analytical method enables projection of the end-customer demand information to upstream of the supply chain and estimate demand forecast at the individual tier levels. The supply chain performance assessment is based on the DueTime Performance metric (DTP - probability to ship a required product/parts volume in a fixed time interval) under the assumption of customer demand following a discrete time Markov process, a special case for correlated demands. A numerical case Study demonstrates the use of the DTP measure for a two-tier supply chain. The analytical results (verified by simulations) quantify important relationships in the supply chain -, involving reliabilities of machines/stations, capacities of the buffers, demands correlation, and the due times and will find use in performance assessment, optimization and design of supply chains.