The main aim of the paper is to highlight the relation between flexibility and vertical integration. To this purpose, we go through the selection of the optimal degree of vertical disintegration of a flexible firm which operates in a dynamic uncertain environment. The enterprise we model enjoys...

It is a well-known fact that there exists an ever increasing number of problems for which, despite the efforts of many inventive and persistent researchers, it seems virtually impossible to find efficient algorithms. In this Situation, the theory of computational complexity may provide helpful...

In railway transportation, each train needs to have a timetable that specifies which track at which time will be occupied by it. This task can be addressed by automatization techniques both in generating a timetable and in optimizing an existing one. In this paper, we give an overview on the...

When considering fairness one must ask two fundamental questions. Firstly, what does it mean to be fair? And secondly, how does one measure that fairness? Different authors have offered different notions and metrics to address these questions. We provide arguments identifying where past metrics...

Facing harsh competition in global marketplaces, management must construct the best possible supply chains to meet client requirements of quality, timely, and diverse products. To accelerate the fabrication rate can help shorten the length of the refilling cycle, and the reworking of repairable...

Traditionally, mathematical optimization methods have been applied in manufacturing industries where production scheduling is one of the most important problems and is being actively researched. Extant studies assume that processing times are known or follow a simple distribution. However, the...