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22
Transportation and
RFID Applications
22.1 INTRODUCTION
A supply chain can be expressed as the parts that are involved, directly or indirectly, in fullling a
customer request (Chopra and Meindl, 2007). By this denition, it can be seen that a supply chain
consists of manufacturers, warehouses, retailers, transporters, and customers. The purpose of a sup-
ply chain is to maximize the value generated for the customer, namely, maximizing the difference
between the nal product worth and the total expended by the supply chain to provide the product
to the customer.
In order to succeed, the supply chain must be conducted to minimize the costs ...