An Integrated Decision Framework for Material Selection Procedure: A Case Study in a Detergent Manufacturer

Abstract

The new product development process (NPD) is considered to be the key factor of competition among different markets. The identification of a suitable material is an important issue in the conception and improvement of new products. Material selection is seen as an important multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) problem in engineering because of the requirement of considering multiple criteria from different dimensions. Improper material selection may negatively affect the success of a firm. The purpose of this study is to specify the importance of selection attributes, which are considered to evaluate washing liquid that meets the needs of both customers and firms. Then, it objects to choose the most appropriate alternative among various formulations. A fuzzy MCDM methodology based on quality function deployment (QFD), 2-tuple fuzzy linguistic representation, and linguistic hierarchies is presented. QFD is used to incorporate customer requirements into the evaluation process. The 2-tuple fuzzy modeling and linguistic hierarchies are employed to combine multi-granular data given by experts. Finally, the fuzzy COPRAS (Complex Proportional Assessment) method is used to choose the most suitable alternative. The implementation of the developed method is presented by a case study conducted on a detergent manufacturer located in Turkey.