Optimization on RFID-enabled CONWIP control strategy for multi-echelon inventory of supply chain

It is very significant to study on the control strategies to improve the performance of multi-echelon inventory systems. As the ability of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) that can count and locate products precisely, it provides a technical way to realize RFID-Enable electronic Card system, based on the system, the CONWIP strategy is extended to the multi-echelon inventory of supply chain. In this paper, a four-echelon inventory of supply chain is exemplified and the strategy is optimized by the simulation-based harmony search optimization method. The parameters of the strategy after optimization are made as the input to the simulation model. To verify the performance of the CONWIP strategy, it is compared with RFID-Enable (s, S) and Push strategies by simulation, the simulation results demonstrate that the strategy can reduce the total cost and enhance the service level effectively.