Prof. M. Balaji

Dr. G.Karuppusami

G. Hari Ramesh Babu

Abstract

The paper reviews emerging patterns in supply chain integration with focus on improving agility of the supply chain. Italso explores the relationship between the emerging patterns and attainment of competitive objectives. Supply chain is a complex system that involves many system elements from various functional areas. Performance of a supply chain heavily depends on the effectiveness ofintegration ofvarious suppliers into the organization and formulating appropriate strategies to improve the responsiveness. This paper focuses on the development of a systematic approach with the following objectives: (1) to improve responsiveness of supply chain (2) to use Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) which offers methodology to rank alternative courses of action based on the decision maker's judgments concerning the importance of the criteria and the extent to which they are met by each alternative.

Keywords- Agility, Supply chain, Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), supplier selection.