The Impact of Transportation Disruption on Adaptive Supply Chain: A Hybrid Simulation Study

Supply chain is a hybrid dynamic system composed of continuous elements (production, saleroom etc.) and discrete elements (transportation, ordering etc.). Traditional method of modeling and simulating supply chain looking supply chain as discrete event system can´t reflect systemic dynamic complexity. This research applies discrete-continuous combined modeling approach to simulate adaptive supply chain in the software any logic platform. Two simulation models were built, one of which is the traditional structure and the other is a vendor managed inventory structure. The supply chains are modeled in continuous time for a 3-echelon supply chain to compare the traditional structure with a VMI structure in terms of finished goods inventory levels of the manufacturer and the distributor when transportation is disrupted. Simulation results show that a VMI structure is better than the traditional structure when transportation disruption occurs.