The present study is an attempt to develop an inventory model for deteriorating items with negative exponential demand. Shortages are allowed with partial back logging. This model is different from the existing models where deterioration is a function of time. Accordingly, three different types of probabilistic deterioration functions have been considered to find the associated decision variables and also to make comparisons among them. The optimality is illustrated with numerical values of system parameters and the graphical representations are given to depict the trend. The necessary observations in obtaining optimal values of decision variables are analyzed in the light of the practical aspect of the developed model. Finally, considering the numerical values of system parameters, sensitivity analyses are carried out to study the effect of changes in most important system parameters.

The role of sustainability in supply chain is becoming critical due to increasing environment related problems and societal issues. Sustainable Supply Chain Management (SSCM) helps in reducing environmental degradation as well as social and economic implications. SSCM practices in Indian industries are in initial stage of implementation and industries find difficult to implement. Therefore, in present research, key enablers to initiate SSCM are recognized and analyzed. This research has recognized twelve enablers with the help of previous researches and expert survey. A Structural framework has been drawn with the use of Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) technique, to understand the relationship among the identified enablers and also to find the reliance of one on another. Further, MICMAC analysis has been employed for evaluating these identified enablers in accordance with Driving power and Dependence power. From ISM Methodology “Government policies and supportive systems” is found to be a key bottom enabler, which is important to implement the SSCM in Indian industries. For further future perspective, Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL), can also be recommended for evaluation purpose. Present research may be helpful to find the importance of different enablers for successful implementation of SSCM in Indian industries.

In recent years, efforts have been made to produce advanced composite materials in order to lessen environmental impact and to extent sustainability. Traditional materials are largely substituted by composites due to their greater properties like flexural strength, low thermal expansion and high strength. Numerous studies are present that show the process of composite materials reinforcement with natural fiber to improve mechanical and thermal properties. The vital aspect of exploitation of natural fiber in composites is associated with biodegradability. An extensive range of different natural fibers has been used for reinforcement till now. In present work, mechanical properties of jute fiber reinforced epoxy and polyester composites manufactured using Taguchi optimization method are investigated, experimentally. It was found that jute reinforced epoxy composite had better mechanical properties than jute polyester composite. Also, Epoxy- jute composite had lower erosion wear rate than polyester jute composites.

The player uses credit financing to perform profitable business. We analyze an economic order quantity model in which items have a fixed lifetime and deteriorate over time. The supplier offers the retailer a full credit period whenever the retailer orders more than or equal to a pre-specified quantity. If the retailer orders less than pre-specified order quantity, then the retailer will do partial payment to the supplier and avail of delay in payments for the remaining outstanding amount. The demand is price-sensitive. The retailer’s profit is maximized by setting appropriate retail price and replenishment time. The algorithm is developed to choose the best policy for the decision maker from the number of alternatives. Numerical data is used to validate the theoretical developments. Managerial insights are discussed. It is observed that for a given units to qualify for avail of partial credit period, increase in ordering cost decreases profit of the retailer. The increase in rate of the purchase cost to avail of delay payment suggests that to have a more profit, retailer should deplete stock before the allowable credit period.

This paper presents the effect of vibratory dissimilar TIG (Tungsten Inert Gas) welding process on hardness of welded joins with respect to change of vibratory parameters. In this study, new vibratory setup with two metal engravers is used to give mechanical vibrations to the specimens to be welded. Finally, the effect of mechanical vibrations with the variation of vibration parameters is studied on the hardness at the weld bead and heat effected zone (HAZ) of welded joints.

Quantity discount is a usual term in business and has been a topic of interest for a long time, but have received very little attention. Many vendors offer different schemes to their customers to increase the existing size of order, which results in higher annual sale for the vendor and a lower purchasing price for the retailer. Therefore, the buyer adjusts his/her selling price, which influences the demand for the product. The objective of this paper is to develop an inventory model for deteriorating products with quantity discount and partial backlogging to determine the optimal ordering quantity for the retailer optimizing the total cost or profit of the associated model. A numerical example is also given to illustrate the model and its significant features.

Cash plays essential role in modern business and economy and it is the life blood of all businesses. Therefore, cash management is the art of managing a company’s short-term resources for its ongoing activities, mobilizing funds and optimizing liquidity. Inefficient cash management may lead the company to bankruptcy. In this paper, we highlight different perspectives in which we can control the corporate cash including Cash Conversion Cycle, Cash Holding and Creditworthiness. The term Cash Conversion Cycle can be considered as a length of time between purchase of raw-materials and collection of cash from debtors. Cash holding is one of the most important financial decisions that the manager of the concerned organization has to make for the organizations. In this paper, we try to interlink among different items to control cash so that bankruptcy could be prevented and profitability would be improved by investigating on five companies from Consumer Durable sector.

Aluminium alloy AlMg4.5Mn has got comprehensive acceptance in the manufacturing of light weight frames, marine structures which require high strength and worthy corrosion revulsion. The present investigation work focuses on friction stir welding process in which influences of operating parameters have been studied on friction stir welded butt joints. The FSWed joints specimens have been produced by experimentation at three levels of tool traverse speed and tool rotational speed keeping input force and tool tilt angle constant. Mechanical properties and microstructure of welded joints have been investigated in the present study. Change in the microstructure at different zones which transforms the mechanical properties of welded joints was due to the asymmetrical flow of material and thermal cycles around the pin. The second phase beta grains are formed as the very high temperature reached due to input parameters combinations. Traverse speed (TS) and tool rotational speed (TRS) are taken in a range of 16-40 mm/min and 500-1400 rpm, respectively. The best combination of parameters results in higher tensile strength which is well supported by the micro-hardness curve and the compact grains microstructure profile. Microstructure at different points and physical properties exhibited by the welded joint are well brought into line to summarize the effects of different parameters.

Data mining is the technique to find hidden patterns from a very large volume of historical data. Association rule is a type of data mining that correlates one set of items or events with another set of items or events. Another data mining strategy is clustering technique. This technique is used to create partitions so that all members of each set are similar according to a specified set of metrics. Both the association rule mining and clustering helps in more effective individual and group decision making for optimal inventory control. Owing to the above facts, association rules are mined from each cluster to find frequent items and then loss profit is calculated for each frequent item. Initially, the clustering algorithm is used to partition the transactional database into different clusters. Apriori, a classic data mining algorithm is utilized for mining association rules from each cluster to find frequent items. Later the loss profit is calculated for each frequent item. The obtained loss profit is used to rank frequent items in each cluster. Thus, the ranking of frequent items in each cluster using the proposed approach greatly facilitate optimal inventory control. An example is illustrated to validate the results.

There is a tremendous growth of the use of the component based software engineering (CBSE) approach for the development of software systems. The selection of the best suited COTS components which fulfils the necessary requirement for the development of software(s) has become a major challenge for the software developers. The complexity of the optimal selection problem increases with an increase in alternative potential COTS components and the corresponding selection criteria. In this research paper, the problem of ranking and selection of Data Base Management Systems (DBMS) components is modeled as a multi-criteria decision making problem. A ‘Fuzzy Distance Based Approach (FDBA)’ method is proposed for the optimal ranking and selection of DBMS COTS components of an e-payment system based on 14 selection criteria grouped under three major categories i.e. ‘Vendor Capabilities’, ‘Business Issues’ and ‘Cost’. The results of this method are compared with other Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) which is termed as a typical multi-criteria decision making approach. The proposed methodology is explained with an illustrated example.