Designing distribution centers is normally formulated in a form of set covering where is primary objective is to minimize the number of connected facilities. However, there are other issues affecting our decision on selecting suitable distribution centers such as weather conditions, temperature, infrastructure facilities, etc. In this paper, we propose a multi-objective set covering techniques where different objectives are considered in an integrated model. The proposed model of this paper is implemented for a real-world case study of truck-industry and the results are analyzed.

When a production facility is designed, there are various parameters affecting the number machines such as production capacity and reliability. It is often a tedious task to optimize different objectives, simultaneously. The other issue is the uncertainty in many design parameters which makes it difficult to reach a desirable solution. In this paper, we present a new mathematical model with two objectives. The primary objective function is considered to be the production capacity and the secondary objective function is total reliability. The proposed model is formulated on different units of production which are connected together in serial form and for each unit, we may have various machines. The resulted model is formulated using recent advances of robust optimization and solution procedure is analyzed with some numerical examples.

This article aims to review, identify and prioritize challenge factors of the implementation of knowledge management portals for Iranian organizations. The study determines several important weakness factors affecting the implications of the knowledge management such as the weakness in organizational strategy, information overcrowd, content management, portals project management, and etc. The study also indicates that the factors have different priorities where managerial factors are in the highest priority and financial factors are in the lowest priority. We also perform factor analysis to summarize seventeen factors into six issues: Financial and information security, Technology and management, Senior management support and strategy, Acceptance, User's motivation and culture, Project management, Change management and training.

During the past three decades there have been tremendous efforts on building steel factories on economic scales. The primary question is to find an economic scale for such plants which could also meet domestic demand. In this paper, we perform an empirical survey to find out whether building small steel factories are more suitable or setting up giant steel industries to meet regional demands. The results indicate that in many countries, building small steel plants based on the recent advances of technologies not only reduces the total cost of steel production but also it could significantly reduce the unnecessary transportation cost, providing cheaper labor, etc. This would lead to better competition which would increase the productivity.