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The purpose of this paper is twofold, first providing researchers with an overview about the uncertainties occurred in procurement including applicable approaches for analyzing different uncertain scenarios, and second proposing directions to inspire future research by identifying research gaps.

Papers related to supply chain risk management and procurement risk management (PRM) from 1995–2017 in several major databases are extracted by keywords and then further filtered based on the relevance to the topic, number of citations and publication year. A total of over 156 papers are selected. Definitions and current approaches related to procurement risks management are reviewed.

Five main risks in procurement process are identified. Apart from summarizing current strategies, suggestions are provided to facilitate strategy selection to handle procurement risks. Seven major future challenges and implications related PRM and different uncertainties are also indicated in this paper.

Procurement decisions making under uncertainty has attracted considerable attention from researchers and practitioners. Despite the increasing awareness for risk management for supply chain, no detail and holistic review paper studied on procurement uncertainty. Managing procurement risk not only need to mitigate the risk of price and lead time, but also need to have sophisticated analysis techniques in supply and demand uncertainty.

The contribution of this review paper is to discuss the implications of the research findings and provides insight about future research. A novel research framework is introduced as reference guide for researchers to apply innovative approach of operations research to resolve the procurements uncertainty problems.

Firms have been implementing lean manufacturing to improve their business performances. However, they have difficulties in the implementation due to the many barriers. In view of the lack of research and the importance in understanding them, the purpose of this paper is identify and evaluate the lean barriers with respect to their levels of importance in implementation.

As lean barriers are scattered in the literature and a variety of performance measures are used in practice, an extensive literature review is first carried out to identify the lean barriers and performance measures. A novel ranking technique – interpretive ranking process (IRP) – is adopted in the evaluation. In the IRP-based evaluation approach, a group discussion technique, where five Indian lean experts are involved, is applied to determine the most important lean barriers and performance measures. Several matrices are developed step by step for calculating the ranks of the selected lean barriers. Upon validating the ranks, an IRP-based lean barrier evaluation model is developed.

The IRP-based lean barrier evaluation model can help firms better understand lean barriers and their levels of importance in lean implementation. In the light of this model, to successfully implement lean, firms should provide sufficient management time and training to employees, develop a right culture, develop effective communication, carry out low-cost production, and obtain external funding.

The evaluation results provide the practitioners with a realistic framework to deal with many problems, especially those related to resource allocation, in lean implementation. Based on the framework, practitioners can prioritize lean barriers during implementation in accordance with performances targeted.

This is the first study that provides a comprehensive review of lean barriers available in the literature and evaluates them in accordance with performance measures. The combined use of literature review and experts in the evaluation approach justifies the value of the study.

The purpose of this paper is twofold. In view of the importance of process platform‐based production configuration (PPbPC) in sustaining product family production efficiency, it is to study the underlying logic for configuring production processes for a product family based on a process platform. Second, it is to apply the Petri nets (PNs) techniques to model PPbPC, in attempting to shed light on the underlying logic.

The authors first identify the fundamental issues in PPbPC, including variety handling, process variation accommodation, configuration at different abstraction levels, and constraint satisfaction. To accommodate the corresponding modelling difficulties, the authors develop a formalism of hierarchical colored timed PNs (HCTPNs) based on the principles of hierarchical PNs, timed PNs, and colored PNs. In the formalism, three types of nets together with a system of HCTPNs are defined to address the modelling of PPbPC.

Applying HCTPNs to vibration motors' case has revealed the logic of specifying complete production processes of final products at different levels of abstraction to achieve production configuration. The preliminary results also further demonstrate the feasibility of modelling PPbPC based on HCTPNs.

Traditional approaches to planning production processes for individual products may limit production performance improvement when companies need to timely produce a high variety of customized products. Systematic methods should be developed to plan production processes for product families so as to achieve production efficiency while utilizing the existing manufacturing resources.

By integrating the advantages of existing PN techniques, the HCTPNs formalism is developed to shed light on planning production processes for product families. The resulting production configuration model can facilitate practitioners to achieve production efficiency in producing large numbers of customized products.

The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it is to introduce a knowledge‐based system for planning processes for families of final products, instead of component items, be they parts or assemblies. Second, it is to demonstrate the feasibility and potential of a prototypical system developed for planning processes families for truck families from a multinational company.

The authors first identify the challenges in planning process families, including data and knowledge representation and constraint handling. To accommodate these challenges, the paper adopts the integrated product and process structure (IP²S) and colored timed Petri nets (CTPNs) in the proposed knowledge‐based process family planning system. On top of the IP²S and CTPNs, XML‐based knowledge representation is employed to alleviate the difficulties in modelling complex product and process family data and planning knowledge while enabling information exchange across different operating platforms. In addition, in accordance with the correspondence between PNs and knowledge‐based systems, a mechanism is designed to cope with the generation of production rules, which model constraints.

The proposed system is able to automatically generate production processes for customized products. At a higher level, such production processes provide input (e.g. operations, machines) to downstream activities for planning process details to manufacture component parts or component assemblies.

Traditional trial and error approaches to planning processes limit production performance improvement when companies need to timely produce diverse customized products. Knowledge‐based systems should be developed to help companies better plan production processes based on the available manufacturing resources.

Unlike most reported studies addressing either detailed process planning or assembly planning for component parts or component assemblies, this study tackles process planning for final products, in attempting to maintain production efficiency from a holistic view.

The purpose of this paper is to propose an adjusted approximate regenerative model (ARM) for a constant‐work‐in‐process (CONWIP)‐based production system that solves the problem of deciding the number of intermediate bulk container in a pharmaceutical company to hold the work in process.

The problem was modeled as a CONWIP system and the ARM was adjusted to estimate the throughput.

By comparing the results from the original ARM and adjusted ARM, a clear superiority of the proposed method is shown for the real case. In addition, the robustness of the adjusted ARM is demonstrated in terms of the violation of rigid assumption and the impacts brought by the limitation of buffer space before the bottleneck station.

The novelty of the proposed model is to take the long transportation time between machines into consideration.

The primary purpose of this paper is to explore possible locations for parity cache within disk array model and describe the disk array model development process.

A dynamic, discrete event simulation model, based on modular, bottom‐up approach, is initiated from a single disk, and then extended on disk array.

Parity information within array model cannot be stored on individual disk cache, instead it should be stored in array cache. If model is used for simulation of single disk array then an approach with separate parity cache should be used, while an approach where a parity cache is part of array cache should be used for simulation of more complex storage systems with numerous arrays.

The proposed model does not include any read‐ahead cache policy, and only a full‐stripe writes can be performed. As a result, the model should be used only for sequential read or write of large files because then those limitations do not influence simulation output.

The novelty depicted in this paper is an approach, in array modelling, with parity cache merged into array cache. Also, the achieved bandwidth for the resulting simulation model differs from 1.05 to 1.7 per cent from the measured one on the experimental array.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a methodology to industry and academia on how to reengineer the order fulfillment process (OFP) by capitalizing on integration and coordination across the entire supply chain to sustain supply chain management.

A case study at a semiconductor equipment manufacturer in Singapore is undertaken.

This paper confirms that the traditional OFPs present companies a challenge to satisfy the demanding customer requirements while achieving performance optimization of each supply chain partner; and it is imperative to reengineer the OFPs to stay competitive. To successfully reengineer OFPs, the efforts should be systematically organized to, for example, exploit potential processes as many as possible, determine an optimal process based on mathematically sound grounds.

The use of a single case study may limit the generalizability of the findings.

A methodology incorporating accountability‐centered approach and simulation is developed for companies to reengineer OFPs while considering the entire supply chain.

The literature does not provide solutions for reengineering OFPs regardless of the fact that OFP reengineering is an emerging area of interest. This paper presents a valuable contribution to this topic by introducing a methodology and by applying the methodology to a semiconductor equipment manufacturer in Singapore.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework for guiding social innovation in service (SIS), defined as the creation of novel, scalable and sustainable market based service offerings that solve systemic societal problems.

This research provides a review and synthesis of transdisciplinary literatures to establish a basis for the conceptual framework proposed for SIS.

It is argued that the primary unit of an SIS is the service firm and that there are micro-, meso-, and macro-level actors and enablers in the ecosystem that can help bring about SIS. Examples from the hospitality and tourism industry are used to demonstrate key points.

Benefits of an SIS to companies include growth through new markets and innovative value offerings, sustainable supply chains in production, building consumer value and trust in the company/brand, attracting and retaining talent and being proactive in including social and environmental measures of success in customer metrics and company financial reporting.

This paper contributes to the social innovation and service literature by: offering a new, scientifically supported view of an SIS; providing managers with a framework to guide social innovation within their service firm and for the benefit of their company and its stakeholders; and directing service scholars to research issues necessary to advance SIS.