SOLVING FACILITY

LOCATION PROBLEM WITH

GREENFIELD ANALYSIS
Green eld analysis (GFA), sometimes called center of gravity analysis, is a supply chain
network design method commonly used on the early stages of supply chain planning.
Green eld analysis helps to effectively solve a facility location problem — to determine the
optimal quantity of distribution centers (DCs) or production facilities and the best locations
to place them. Green eld analysis should be your rst step in supply chain network design.
To run GFA you do not need to come up with any options for facilities locations, the task of
green eld analysis is to offer you these options from scratch.

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Green eld analysis assumes a high level of abstraction, so a minimum number of details
will be needed:
Locations of the customers
Products
Demand for each customer and product
Direct distance between customers and DCs

The output of the analysis is an approximate, optimal location for a production or

warehousing facility at which the cost of all inbound and outbound transportation is
minimized. This optimal point is called the center of gravity.
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The basic
cookies green
we use eld
see our analysis
Cookie Policy.does not take into account roads, cities, peculiarities of
geographical areas, etc. — it just offers the optimal mathematical solution. Its more
advanced variations include green eld analysis
Accept with roads and brown eld analysis.
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The results of green eld analysis can be used in further supply chain network optimization
 g y pp y p
— to nd the optimal site locations from several pre-suggested and more realistically-
placed options.

To learn how a green eld analysis experiment in anyLogistix can help you nd the optimal
solution to a facility location problem, read the Supply Chain Simulation and Optimization
book. The book includes the example Excel scenarios to practice model building in
anyLogistix. Download the free version of anyLogistix software and start exploring its
capabilities.

read the book try anylogistix

GREENFIELD ANALYSIS WITH ROADS

A green eld analysis with roads is an advanced version of a basic GFA experiment. It uses
the same set of data and de nes the optimal location for the certain quantity of DCs. The
only difference is that this experiment is set to consider real roads and the population of
cities. So, if road network and infrastructure coverage in your area is uneven, you will get
more realistic and geographically accurate results using green eld analysis with roads. If
the terrain is at and covered with roads evenly, basic GFA will provide more
mathematically accurate results.

For a deeper dive into green eld analysis with roads in anyLogistix, you can watch the
following how-to video.

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Center of gravity analysis example
SUPPLY CHAIN RESRUCTURING WITH BROWNFIELD ANALYSIS
While green eld analysis is used to nd the optimal locations to setup a preset number of
new production facilities or warehouses, the brown eld analysis (BFA) can be used for
supply chain restructuring or expansion of existing networks.

Brown eld analysis can be very useful when you already have an active supply chain but
need to restructure it, for example, due to addition of new customers in remote locations or
as a consequence of mergers and acquisitions.

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In anyLogistix, brown eld analysis uses & Continue
the green eld analysis experiment but with
changes to the input data to re ect the existing supply chain. You will need to de ne:
 Objects of your existing supply chain, which should remain in the network after supply
chain restructuring (DCs, production facilities, customers)
Demand of all customers
Connections between the existing objects

Brown eld analysis will generate a number of additional facilities, their locations, and
demand. Using BFA you can also gure out how to easily integrate the new objects into the
existing supply chain structure and carry out a supply chain restructuring quickly and
ef ciently.

Summing up, we can say that green eld and brown eld analyses are extremely useful tools
for basic review of the supply chain structure and its future optimization. Carrying out these
experiments with anyLogistix, you can:
Find the number of supply chain facilities and determine their locations with minimum
data input.
Determine optimal locations for network elements if your supply chain has several
tiers.
Effectively expand your existing supply chain with brown eld analysis.
Carry out precise analysis of your supply chain by converting GFA results into a
network optimization or dynamic simulation model.

Looking for ways to create an optimal supply chain network? Start building your supply
chain model with anyLogistix software.

try alx

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