Integration of Web Services technology with business models within the total product design process for supplier selection

Supplier selection plays a vital role in the process of product development. The purpose of this research is to integrate the state of the art Web technologies with business theories to establish a Web-based distributed environment for supplier selection. A Web Services-oriented multi-possibility supplier selection system has been developed, which helps manufacturers to make decisions for selecting supplier more effectively and accurately. The business theories and analytic hierarchy process approach have been applied in combination with Web Services and J2EE Technology in the system. In this paper, a brief review of the current supplier selection issues are addressed first, followed by the presentation of the methodologies employed and description of the system structure and main features, an example is given in the end. (C) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.