Abstract:
The Beer Distribution Game is widely used in the teaching of Supply Chain Management and
other complex interacting systems. The lessons illustrated by the game are accepted as having
a useful level of validity, and interesting cases have been noted that support the notion that the
game captures the dynamics of real systems. This paper is a preliminary description of a novel
approach to the modelling of the game. Our model has been developed using conventional Java
based agents, but persistent data has been stored in the Open Source relational data base
management system (RDBMS), MySQL. This model Jorms the first stage of a project that will
use this framework to examine a range of rules and system design features that can be used to
define multi level supply chains. This approach will also enable the simulation component of
the model to be interfaced to real systems that store dynamic information in RDBMS.
