Order promising process for extended collaborative selling chain

This paper presents a solution method that supports the order promising (OP) process of a product-pack (P-P) in an extended collaborative selling chain (ECOSELL) domain. A P-P is a group of products with complementary functions that can be jointly commercialised. The flexible dimensions of a P-P order request are the conventional ones (quantity, due date, delivery location and price) plus an additional dimension: the possibility of defining dependencies among the other flexible dimensions. Furthermore, the P-P products can belong to different supply chains that must be properly co-ordinated in order to provide a reliable response to the customer. These features make the P-P OP process more complex than the traditional one. Due to the lack of works on this topic, the first step consists of defining all possible P-P OP scenarios. A new three-tier solution method for the proper management of due date and delivery location quoting in all possible P-P OP scenarios is presented in this paper. Only the first tier is described in detail. Results derived from the application of the solution method to a pilot composed by two supply chains belonging to the ceramic and kitchen furniture sectors are also reported.