Selection of air compressor for pharmaceuticals: An approach with TOPSIS.

Air compressor is one of the most essential utility machines for the pharmaceutical industry. Ensuring the engineering parameters of the industrial compressor as well as maintaining the hygiene standard of the air at the same time is a complex task. This often creates a decision-making challenge while selecting an air compressor for a pharmaceutical factory. Therefore, this study discusses the most important selection criteria of an air compressor to be used in the pharmaceutical industry. Among all the criteria, 7 measurable criteria have been sorted out to be utilized in a Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) technique, the Technique for Order Performance by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) method. In this study, electricity consumption, free air delivery, maximum working pressure, noise level, installation surface area, oil content in the air, and solid particulate filter have been taken as criteria in the case study of selecting the best compressor. Among the 5 alternatives, compressor A4 has obtained the most performance score by the TOPSIS method, thereby finally selected in this study. The discussion about the selection criteria of air compressors for pharmaceuticals and the selection framework presented by utilizing the TOPSIS method is expected to help the industrial managers of pharmaceuticals to overcome their decision-making challenges of compressor selection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]