Multi-agent-based Multi-attribute Negotiation for Supply Chain Coordination in Large-scale Construction Project

摘要

Many large-scale construction projects (LCPs) are implemented or planned to meet the needs of the rapid economic development in China's industrialization. However, there are many problems in the development cycle of LCPs, such as fragmentation, budget overrun, time overrun and high waste. These problems are often caused by the lack of coordination in their supply chains. Supply chain coordination (SCC) for LCPs becomes a critical success factor for performance improvement and sustainable development of the construction industry in China. This research designs a multi-agent based multi-attribute negotiation framework for LCPs SCC through adopting the agent technology and regarding supply chain as a typical multi-agent system. Since different members in the supply chain have different preferences on the decision attributes (such as cost, time, quality, safety and environment), a multi-attribute negotiation mechanism is established by constructing the multi-attribute negotiation model, describing the negotiation process, and designing negotiation protocol. Finally, a prototype system is developed and tested on a hypothetical LCP. The experiment indicates that the negotiation mechanism can solve problems in LCPs supply chain and provides a solution to LCPs SCC.