Application of Service Modular Design Based on a Fuzzy Design Structure Matrix: A Case Study from the Mining Industry

The development of customized service is an important way to transform and upgrade China’s mining industry. However, in practice, there remain problems, such as the slow market response speed of service providers and the contradiction between the large-scale development of service providers and the personalized service needs of service demanders. This paper uses the theory and method of service modular design to solve these problems and explores the process-based service modular design method. Service modular design depends largely on the determination of the relationship between service activities and the reasonable division of modules. However, previous research has rarely made use of modular design methods and modeling tools in the mining service context. At the same time, evaluations of the relationship between service activities relying on knowledge and those relying on experience have been inconclusive. Therefore, this paper proposes a service modularization design method based on the fuzzy relation analysis of a design structure matrix (DSM) that solves the optimal module partition scheme. Triangular fuzzy number and fuzzy evidence theory are used to evaluate and fuse the multidimensional and heterogeneous relationship between service activities, and the quantitative processing of the comprehensive relationship between service activities is carried out. On this basis, the service module structure is divided, followed by the construction of the mathematical programming model with the maximum sum of the average cohesion degree in the module and the average coupling degree between modules as the driving goal. The genetic algorithm is used to solve the problem, and the optimal module division result is obtained. Finally, taking the service modular design of SHD coal production enterprises in China as an example, the feasibility of the proposed method is verified.