A multi-agent based multi-attribute negotiation framework for construction supply chain coordination

Many researches and practices witness that there still are many problems, such as fragmentation, budget overrun, time overrun and high waste in construction process, most of which are supply chain problems. These problems are often caused by the lack of coordination between organizations in supply chains. This research regards construction supply chain as a typical multi-agent system and designs a multi-agent based multi-attribute negotiation framework for construction supply chain coordination (MANCSCC). This framework integrates the specialty agents (contractor agent, designer agent, supplier agent, owner agent, etc.) and service agents (coordinator agent, monitor agent, name server agent) into a multi-agent system through the Internet to improve decision-making efficiency. Since different members in construction supply chain have different preferences on decision-making attributes, such as cost, time, quality, safety and environment, a multi-attribute negotiation mechanism is established by describing the multi-attribute negotiation process and designing the multi-attribute negotiation protocol. The design of this mechanism is based on negotiation theory and utility theory and aimed at promoting the coordination between specialty agents. A prototype system is developed and tested on a hypothetical construction project. The experiment indicates that MANCSCC provides a solution to construction supply chain coordination.