考虑互惠偏好的闭环供应链系统合作机制研究

将互惠偏好引入到闭环供应链系统合作机制中,研究了由一个制造商,一个零售商和一个再制造商组成的三层闭环供应链,运用Stackelberg博弈理论分析了闭环供应链整体及各成员的最优决策问题,并对5种情形(决策模式)下的均衡结果进行比较分析.研究发现在考虑互惠偏好行为下,分散决策模式和局部联盟决策模式下的系统利润低于集中决策模式下的收益;新产品和再制造产品的销售量(零售价格)与制造商对零售商的互惠偏好系数呈正(负)相关,与零售商对制造商的互惠偏好系数呈负(正)相关;5种决策模式的供应链系统利润与制造商对零售商的互惠偏好系数呈正相关,与零售商对制造商的互惠偏好系数呈负相关.     

反S型权重风险偏好对一类两级供应链的影响

大量实证研究表明,人们在不确定条件下,总是倾向于高估小概率事件并低估大概率事件,呈现反型权重风险偏好的特点。本文针对一类常见的由单供应商和单零售商组成的两级供应链,其中供应商有随机产出风险,分别考察了供应商与零售商的风险态度对其决策的影响。通过构建斯坦伯格博弈模型分析了供需双方的最优订购量和最优计划生产量。结果表明,供需双方或一方有反型风险态度时,保证供需双方均有激励动机签订契约的前提下,分散决策供应链的效率可达到集中决策的效果,也即供应链有可能达到协调。     

Channel coordination through a revenue sharing contract in a two-period newsboy problem

This paper studies channel coordination through revenue sharing contract between a single retailer and a single wholesaler in a two-period newsboy problem. Two models are discussed, a single-buying-opportunity model and a two-buying-opportunity model. We discuss how the revenue sharing ratio and the wholesale prices are to be determined in order to achieve channel coordination and a win–win outcome. We find that the wholesale prices are set to be lower than the retail prices and the optimal revenue sharing ratio is linearly increasing in the wholesale prices. The proposed revenue sharing contract has more flexibility than price protection, in that the optimal revenue sharing ratio can be settled reasonably through negotiation between the retailer and wholesaler.     

Optimal ordering and transfer policy for an inventory with stock dependent demand

This paper deals with an ordering-transfer inventory model to determine the retailer’s optimal order quantity and the number of transfers per order from the warehouse to the display area. It is assumed that the amount of display space is limited and the demand rate depends on the display stock level. The objective is to maximize the average profit per unit time yielded by the retailer. The proposed models and algorithms are developed to find the optimal strategy by retailer. Numerical examples are presented to illustrate the models developed and the sensitivity analysis is also reported.     

零售商主导的模糊供应链博弈——考虑销售努力的情形

以包含一个制造商与一个零售商的两级供应链为研究对象,考虑零售商居于主导地位并付出销售努力时供应链各成员的决策。结合经济环境的不确定性,将市场需求函数和制造商的制造成本、零售商的经营成本视为模糊变量;运用斯塔克尔伯格模型刻画零售商和制造商之间的博弈过程,并引入期望值模型、机会约束模型来解决最优决策问题;通过一个数值算例证明了供应链博弈模型的有效性。研究表明,在均衡结果中,考虑到零售商所承担的销售努力成本,其总体期望值利润相比于制造商而言偏低,但单位产品边际利润较高。原因在于,零售商的主导地位使其不仅通过销售努力提高产品销量,提高了供应链的整体利润,同时也能够采用压低批发价格的方式,使自身在供应链中获取更多收益。     

Ordering and pricing decisions in a two-echelon supply chain with asymmetric demand information

This article examines coordinated decisions in a decentralized supply chain that consists of one supplier and one retailer, and faces random demand of a single product with a short life cycle. We consider a setting where the retailer has accurate demand information while the supplier does not. Such a problem with asymmetric demand information can be viewed as an extension of the newsboy problem in which both the supplier and the retailer possess the same demand information. Combining the mechanism of sharing demand information and that of quantity discount and return policy enables us to develop three coordinated models in contrast with the basic and uncoordinated model. We are able to show the ordinal relationship among the retailer’s optimal order quantities in these four models under a general form of random demand, and compare the supply chain profits and conduct sensitivity analysis analytically in four models under uniform random demand. We also provide numerical results under normal random demand that bear a resemblance to those under uniform random demand.     

Optimal ordering and pricing policy with supplier quantity discounts and price-dependent stochastic demand

We study a joint ordering and pricing problem for a retailer whose supplier provides all-unit quantity discount for the product. Both generalized disjunctive programming model and mixed integer nonlinear programming model are presented to formulate the problem. Some properties of the problem are analysed, based on which a solution algorithm is developed. Two numerical examples are presented to illustrate the problem, which are solved by our solution algorithm. Managerial analysis indicates that supplier quantity discount has much influence on the ordering and pricing policy of the retailer and more profit can be obtained when the supplier provides quantity discount.     

Cooperative game analysis of retail space-exchange problems

We analyze retail space-exchange problems where two or more retailers exchange their excess retail spaces to improve the utilization of their space resource. We first investigate the two-retailer space exchange problem. In order to entice both retailers with different bargaining powers to exchange their spaces, we use the generalized Nash bargaining scheme to allocate the total profit surplus between the two retailers. Next, we consider the space-exchange problem involving three or more retailers, and construct a cooperative game in characteristic function form. We show that the game is essential and superadditive, and also prove that the core is non-empty. Moreover, in order to find a unique allocation scheme that ensures the stability of the grand coalition, we propose a new approach to compute a weighted Shapley value that satisfies the core conditions and also reflects retailers’ bargaining powers. Our analysis indicates that the space exchange by more retailers can result in a higher system-wide profit surplus and thus a higher allocation to each retailer under a fair scheme.     

货架和仓库商品共同影响需求的供应链延期支付协调

针对单一制造商和单一零售商组成的供应链,研究了需求受货架和仓库库存水平共同影响的企业间延期支付协调问题.首先根据制造商主导的Stackelberg对策结构,对供应链成员间的决策问题进行了分析;然后为制造商提出了一个改善整个供应链运作效率的延期支付策略,研究结果表明该延期支付模型不仅能提高制造商的利润,而且能提高零售商的利润.最后给出了数值例子,并对模型参数灵敏度进行了分析.     

Optimal selection of retailers for a manufacturing vendor in a vendor managed inventory system

A Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) system consists of a manufacturing vendor and a number of retailers. In such a system, it is essential for the vendor to optimally determine retailer selection and other related decisions, such as the product’s replenishment cycle time and the wholesale price, in order to maximize his profit. Meanwhile, each retailer’s decisions on her willingness to enter the system and retail price are simultaneously considered in the retailer selection process. However, the above interactive decision making is complex and the available studies on interactive retailer selection are scarce. In this study, we formulate the retailer selection problem as a Stackelberg game model to help the manufacturer, as a vendor, optimally select his retailers to form a VMI system. This model is non-linear, mixed-integer, game-theoretic, and analytically intractable. Therefore, we further develop a hybrid algorithm for effectively and efficiently solving the developed model. The hybrid algorithm combines dynamic programming (DP), genetic algorithm (GA) and analytical methods. As demonstrated by our numerical studies, the optimal retailer selection can increase the manufacturer’s profit by up to 90% and the selected retailers’ profits significantly compared to non-selection strategy. The proposed hybrid algorithm can solve the model within a minute for a problem with 100 candidate retailers, whereas a pure GA has to take more than 1 h to solve a small sized problem of 20 candidate retailers achieving an objective value no worse than that obtained by the hybrid algorithm.     

Some two-echelon style-goods inventory models with asymmetric market information

A “two-echelon” newsboy problem considers the interactive decisions between the “manufacturer” and the “retailer” – now recognized as two separate entities. Earlier papers on this problem assumed that the two parties share the same market information. We extend this problem by studying the situation in which the retailer has better market information than the manufacturer. Presented are several decision models that should be useful for guiding a manufacturer's decisions. Moreover, solutions to these models lead to various unexpected and interesting conclusions. For example, we found that improved retailer's market-knowledge always benefits the manufacturer and the system, though not necessarily the retailer himself. In contrast, improved manufacturer's knowledge benefits only the manufacturer himself at the expense of the retailer and of the system.     

Terminal control of boundary models

A terminal optimal control problem for finite-dimensional static boundary models is formulated. The finite-dimensional models determine the initial and terminal states of the plant. The choice of an optimal control drives the plant from one state to another. A saddle-point method is proposed for solving this problem. The convergence of the method in a Hilbert space is proved.     

基于产品生命周期的闭环供应链定价和协调策略研究

研究产品生命周期条件下一个制造商、一个零售商组成的闭环供应链的定价和协调策略:制造商第一周期只生产新品,从第二周期开始生产再制造品,并负责回收。建立了两周期、多周期和无限周期下的分散决策模型和多周期下的集中决策模型,得到最优定价和生产策略。结果表明:两周期中,制造商和零售商应根据不同的成本节约额制定不同的批发价、零售价和生产量。多周期中,当成本节约额比较小时,除第一和最后一个周期外,制造商和零售商应采取相同的定价和生产策略;当成本节约额比较大时,除第一和最后两个周期外,制造商和零售商应采取相同的定价和生产策略。无限周期中,除第一周期以外,制造商和零售商都应该采取相同的定价和生产策略。在有限周期情况下,制造商和零售商应通过在前期制定比较低的批发价和零售价,以提高生产量和销售量,使得后期的回收量增大,达到降低成本的目的。通过引入收益共享契约制定合适的批发价和销售收入及再制造收益共享比率可以协调整个闭环供应链。算例验证了上述结论。     

Epsilon‐stable quasi‐static brittle fracture evolution

We introduce a new definition of stability, ε‐stability, that implies local minimality and is robust enough for passing from discrete‐time to continuous‐time quasi‐static evolutions, even with very irregular energies. We use this to give the first existence result for quasi‐static crack evolutions that both predicts crack paths and produces states that are local minimizers at every time, but not necessarily global minimizers. The key ingredient in our model is the physically reasonable property, absent in global minimization models, that whenever there is a jump in time from one state to another, there must be a continuous path from the earlier state to the later along which the energy is almost decreasing. It follows that these evolutions are much closer to satisfying Griffith's criterion for crack growth than are solutions based on global minimization, and initiation is more physical than in global minimization models. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The newsvendor problem with an in-season price adjustment

Consider a retailer stocking a seasonal item facing a stochastic demand where information about the demand becomes more accurate as the selling season progresses. The retailer places orders before the start of the season and in-season reorders are not possible. This article extends the classical newsvendor model by allowing the retailer to make an in-season price adjustment after conducting a review and using the realized demand to obtain an accurate estimate of the remaining demand. Our results include answers to the following questions. What price should the retailer choose? How much should the retailer have ordered at the start of the season given the option of adjusting prices in-season? This model was motivated by a problem in car rental revenue management and has applications in perishable assets revenue management (PARM), where price adjustments are needed towards the end of the selling season.     

基于Logit离散选择模型的品类优化问题综述

品类优化问题(Assortment Optimization Problem)是收益管理的经典问题.它研究零售商在满足运营约束的前提下,应如何从给定产品集合中选择一个子集提供给消费者,以最大化预期收益.该问题的核心在于如何准确地刻画消费者在面对细分产品时的选择行为、建立相应的优化模型并设计高效率的求解算法.基于Logit离散选择模型的品类优化问题:首先,介绍了基于Multinomial Logit模型的品类优化问题.然后介绍了两个更复杂的变种:第一个是基于两层以及多层Nested Logit模型的品类优化问题,这类问题可合理刻画细分产品之间的"替代效应";第二个是基于Mixtures of Multinomial Logits模型的品类优化问题,这类问题可充分考虑消费者群体的异质性.随后,介绍了数据驱动的品类优化问题的相关进展.最后,指出该问题未来可能的若干研究方向.     

An uncooperative order model for items with trade credit,inventory-dependent demand and limited displayed-shelf space

This paper considers a two-echelon supply chain where a supplier sells a single product through a retailer, who faces an inventory-dependent demand. The supplier hopes to incentive the retailer to order more items by offering trade credit. The retailer places the ordered items on the display shelf (DS) with limited space and stocks the remaining items (if any) that exceed the shelf capacity in his/her backroom/warehouse (BW). From the supplier’s perspective, we focus mainly on under which conditions the supplier should offer trade credit and how he/she should design such trade credit policy and corresponding ordering policy to obtain much more benefits. From the retailer’s perspective, we discuss whether the retailer needs BW and exactly how many items need to be stocked in BW when the supplier offers trade credit. We formulate a “supplier-Stackelberg” game model, from which we obtain the conditions under which the presented simple trade credit policy not only increases the overall chain profit but also each member’s profit. We also show that the trade credit policy is always more beneficial to the retailer than to the supplier if it is offered.     

Efficient formulations for pricing under attraction demand models

We propose a modeling and optimization framework to cast a broad range of fundamental multi-product pricing problems as tractable convex optimization problems. We consider a retailer offering an assortment of differentiated substitutable products to a population of customers that are price-sensitive. The retailer selects prices to maximize profits, subject to constraints on sales arising from inventory and capacity availability, market share goals, bounds on allowable prices and other considerations. Consumers’ response to price changes is represented by attraction demand models, which subsume the well known multinomial logit (MNL) and multiplicative competitive interaction demand models. Our approach transforms seemingly non-convex pricing problems (both in the objective function and constraints) into convex optimization problems that can be solved efficiently with commercial software. We establish a condition which ensures that the resulting problem is convex, prove that it can be solved in polynomial time under MNL demand, and show computationally that our new formulations reduce the solution time from days to seconds. We also propose an approximation of demand models with multiple overlapping customer segments, and show that it falls within the class of demand models we are able to solve. Such mixed demand models are highly desirable in practice, but yield a pricing problem which appears computationally challenging to solve exactly.     

Marketing-production decisions under independent and integrated channel structure

The topic of channel structure has recently attracted much attention among researchers in the marketing and economics area. However, in a majority of the existing literature the cost considerations are extremely simplified with the major focus being pricing policy. What happens when cost incurring decisions are strongly connected with pricing policies? This is the theme we wish to explore in the present paper. The non-trivial costs considered are production, inventory, and retailer effort rate, i.e. we seek to explore the marketing-production channel. We have used the methodology of differential games. The open-loop Stackelberg solution concept has been used to solve the manufacturer and retailer's problem. The Pareto solution concept has been used to solve the problem of the vertically integrated firm. The production, pricing, and effort rate policies thus derived have been compared to obtain insights into the impact of channel structure on these policies. Also, to examine the relation between channel structure and the retailing operation requiring effort, we derive the Stackelberg and Pareto solutions with and without effort rate as a decision variable. We show that once the production rate becomes positive, it does not become zero again. This implies production smoothing. However, none of the gains of production smoothing are passed on to the retailer. The optimal production rate and the inventory policy are a linear combination of the nominal demand rate, the peak demand factor, the salvage value, and the initial inventory. Also, as opposed to some of the existing literature, the optimal policies need not necessarily be concave in nature. In the scenario where the relating operation does not require effort, the pricing policies of the manufacturer and the retailer, and the production policy of the manufacturer have a synergistic effect. However, in the scenario where the retailing operation does benefit from effort, the retailer's pricing policy need not necessarily be synergistic with other policies. With regard to channel structures, it seems that production smoothing will be done more efficiently in the integrated setup. Also, we show that the price paid by the consumer need not necessarily be lower in the integrated setup. But despite higher prices, the channel profits are higher in the integrated setup. This implies a conflict between the interests of the consumers and the firm. Also, this contradicts the results of some of the earlier papers that have used simple static models.     

Dynamic pricing of limited inventories for multi-generation products

In this research, we consider a retailer selling products from two different generations, both with limited inventory over a predetermined selling horizon. Due to the spatial constraints or the popularity of a given product, the retailer may only display goods from one specific generation. If the transaction of the displayed item cannot be completed, the retailer may provide an alternative from another generation. We analyze two models - posted-pricing-first model and negotiation-first model. The former considers negotiation as being allowed on the price of the second product only and in the latter, only the price of the first product is negotiable. Our results show that the retailer can adopt both models effectively depending on the relative inventory levels of the products. In addition, the retailer is better off compared to the take-it-or-leave-it pricing when the inventory level of the negotiable product is high.