Non-cooperative competition among revenue maximizing service providers with demand learning

This paper recognizes that in many decision environments in which revenue optimization is attempted, an actual demand curve and its parameters are generally unobservable. Herein, we describe the dynamics of demand as a continuous time differential equation based on an evolutionary game theory perspective. We then observe realized sales data to obtain estimates of parameters that govern the evolution of demand; these are refined on a discrete time scale. The resulting model takes the form of a differential variational inequality. We present an algorithm based on a gap function for the differential variational inequality and report its numerical performance for an example revenue optimization problem.     

A note on price and quality competition between asymmetric firms

This paper analyzes the impact of asymmetry between firms on the outcome of price and quality competition from a microeconomic viewpoint. Consumers purchase a product based on not only its price but also its quality level; therefore, two firms compete in determining their prices and quality levels to maximize their profits. The asymmetry arises from the difference in consumers’ loyalty to each firm; that asymmetry then determines a character of differentiation between firms. Our purpose is to show how asymmetry influences competition under varying consumers’ price- and quality-sensitivity. In doing so, we extend earlier work in the area of price and quality competition. We show that in both the moderately quality-sensitive and price-sensitive markets, higher consumers’ sensitivity as well as lower consumers’ loyalty to any firm leads to intense competition, resulting in a decrease of both firms’ equilibrium profits. On the other hand, in highly quality-sensitive market, asymmetry compels the smaller firm to change its competitive strategy. In general, this is more beneficial to the larger firm, as the smaller firm’s profit tends to decline. In the worst case, the smaller firm is driven out of business under equilibrium.     

Price and QoS competition in data communication services

Pricing of data communication services has been studied, but primarily in a monopolistic setting. We study the price competition in packet-switching networks with a quality-of-service (QoS) guarantee in terms of an expected per-packet delay. We propose a general framework in which service providers offering multi-class priority-based services compete to maximize their profits, while satisfying the expected delay guarantee in each class. We first examine the price competition with fixed delay guarantees and then extend it to the situation where providers compete in quality of service as well as price. In each case, we compare the duopoly pricing scheme with the case when two service providers merge to become a monopoly provider.     

Price and quality competition: The effect of differentiation and vertical integration

This paper studies an instance of price and quality competition between firms as seen in the recent Internet market. Consumers purchase a product based on not only its price but also its quality level; therefore, two firms compete in determining their prices and quality levels to maximize their profits. Characterizing this competition from a microeconomic viewpoint, we consider two possible business strategies that firms can utilize to overcome the competition—the differentiation and the vertical integration with another complementary firm. We show an interesting result not seen in the well-known Bertrand price competition: not only does the differentiation always increase the firms’ profits, but also it can increase the consumer’s welfare in a quality-sensitive market. We further derive that under some mild conditions the monopolistic vertical integration that excludes the combination-purchase with a competitor’s product is beneficial for both the integrated firm and its consumers.     

The risk and information sharing of application services supply chain

We study an application services supply chain consisting of one application service provider (ASP) and one application infrastructure provider (AIP). The AIP supplies the computer capacity to the ASP that in turn sells the value-added application services to the market. The market is characterized by a price-sensitive random demand. The ASP’s objective is to determine the optimal price of its service to the market and the optimal capacity to purchase from the AIP. The AIP’s goal on the other hand is to maximize its profit from selling the capacity to the ASP.     

多服务商竞争环境下的服务价格与服务能力决策:以物流服务为例

以物流服务为研究对象,通过对不同服务商物流服务能力差异性的分析,建立了多服务商竞争环境下的排队模型,以利润最大化为目标,对服务商的服务价格和服务能力决策进行了研究,研究结果对进一步探讨多服务商横向联盟、区域物流市场规模等问题提供了一定的基础.     

The domination and competition graphs of a tournament

Vertices x and y dominate a tournament T if for all vertices z ≠ x, y, either x beats z or y beats z. Let dom(T) be the graph on the vertices of T with edges between pairs of vertices that dominate T. We show that dom(T) is either an odd cycle with possible pendant vertices or a forest of caterpillars. While this is not a characterization, it does lead to considerable information about dom(T). Since dom(T) is the complement of the competition graph of the tournament formed by reversing the arcs of T, complementary results are obtained for the competition graph of a tournament. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J. Graph Theory 29: 103–110, 1998     

Pricing and Advertising of Private and National Brands in a Dynamic Marketing Channel

We consider a marketing channel where a retailer sells, along the manufacturer’s brand, its own store brand. We assume that each player invests in advertising in order to build the brand’s goodwill. One distinctive feature of this paper is the introduction of the negative effect of own advertising on other player’s goodwill stock evolution. We characterize feedback-Nash pricing and advertising strategies and assess the impact of the store brand and national brand’s goodwill stocks on these strategies in different settings. The main findings suggest first that investing in building up some equity for each brand reduces the price competition between them and propels the market power for both. Second, the retailer will pass to consumer an increase in its purchasing cost of the national brand in all situations as no coordination is taken into account to counter the double marginalization problem. Finally, the higher the brand equity of the store brand, the more the retailer invests in advertising.     

解析辊拔问题的变上限与参变量积分

本文建立与Ａｖｉｔｚｕｒ不同的直角坐标系速度场与应变速率场，并采用变上限积分与参变量积分获得辊拔力的上界解析解。     

一类带有竞争和自反时滞的网站竞争系统的Hopf分支

不同于以往研究网站竞争系统时,仅考虑带有自反时滞或竞争时滞的情况,本文研究了一类同时带有竞争时滞和自反时滞的网站竞争系统,并以时滞作为分支参数,通过分析正平衡点处的特征方程,研究了正平衡点的稳定性,证明了Hopf分支的存在性,得到了发生Hopf分支时的临界的时滞值,最后通过数值模拟进一步验证了所得结论.     

Modelling and analysis of a software system with improvements in the testing phase

In this paper, we consider the error detection phenomena in the testing phase when modifications or improvements can be made to the software in the testing phase. The occurrence of improvements is described by a homogeneous Poisson process with intensity rate denoted by λ. The error detection phenomena is assumed to follow a nonhomogeneous Poisson process (NHPP) with the mean value function being denoted by m(t). Two models are presented and in one of the models, we have discussed an optimal release policy for the software taking into account the occurrences of errors and improvements. Finally, we discuss the possibility of an improvement removing k errors with probability p_k, k ≥ 0 in the software and develop a NHPP model for the error detection phenomena in this situation.     

Hopf bifurcation and analysis of equilibrium for a third-order differential equation in a model of competition

1. IntroductionOne of the more challenging aspects of mathematical biology is competition modelling.Although the mathematical idea is simple[1], this type of modelling is so difficult to carryout in any generality since there are so maily ways for a population to compete.The simplest form of competition is called eXPloitative competition. This occurs whenone or more populations compete for the same resources such as a common food supplyor a growth-limiting nutriellt. A simple example of this…     

多期动态背景下的债务共谋与产品市场竞争关系模型研究

利用超博弈理论分析方法建立了多期动态背景下的债务共谋与产品市场竞争关系模型并进行了分析。发现在战略替代下，一个产业中公司之间相互竞争程度越高，则维持零负债共谋战略所需要的折现系数就越大，产业竞争程度较高的公司偏离零负债共谋的可能性越大。因此，债务共谋结论重新加强了竞争程度与最优杠杆正相关的观点。     

二人零和连续对策上的判断与最优策略间的关系

引进了二人零和连续对策上的判断，判断块以及在判断下的最优策略等概念．研究了判断下的最优策略集与经典最优策略集之间的关系，得到了一些在理论上有趣而且有用的结果．     

Online and semi-online scheduling of two machines under a grade of service provision

We consider the online scheduling of two machines under a grade of service (GoS) provision and its semi-online variant where the total processing time is known. Respectively for the online and semi-online problems, we develop algorithms with competitive ratios of and which are shown to be optimal.     

具有功能反应的两斑块扩散时滞竞争系统正周期解的存在性

§ 1　ＩｎｔｒｏｄｕｃｔｉｏｎＦｏｒｍａｎｙｓｐｅｃｉｅｓｔｈｅｓｐａｔｉａｌｆａｃｔｏｒｓａｒｅｉｍｐｏｒｔａｎｔｉｎｐｏｐｕｌａｔｉｏｎｄｙｎａｍｉｃｓ .Ｔｈｅｔｈｅｏｒｅｔｉｃａｌｓｔｕｄｙｏｆｓｐａｔｉａｌｄｉｓｔｒｉｂｕｔｉｏｎｈａｓｂｅｅｎｅｘｔｅｎｓｉｖｅｌｙｓｔｕｄｉｅｄｉｎｍａｎｙｐａｐｅｒｓ .Ｍｏｓｔｏｆｔｈｅｐｒｅｖｉｏｕｓｐａｐｅｒｓｆｏｃｕｓｅｄｏｎｔｈｅｃｏｅｘｉｓｔｅｎｃｅｏｆｐｏｐｕｌａｔｉｏｎｓｍｏｄｅｌｌｅｄｂｙｓｔｓｔｅｍｓｏｆｏｒｄｉｎａｒｙｄｉｆｆｅｒｅ…     

On the existence and stability of a unique almost periodic solution of Schoener’s competition model with pure-delays and impulsive effects

In this paper, we consider an almost periodic Schoener’s competition model with delays and impulsive effects. Sufficient conditions which guarantee the permanence of the model and the existence of a unique uniformly asymptotically stable positive almost periodic solution are obtained. The result of this paper is completely new. An suitable example is employed to illustrate the feasibility of the main results.     

Analysis of a time-limited service priority queueing system with exponential timer and server vacations

We consider a multi-class priority queueing system with a non-preemptive time-limited service controlled by an exponential timer and multiple (or single) vacations. By reducing the service discipline to the Bernoulli schedule, we obtain an expression for the Laplace-Stieltjes transform (LST) of the waiting time distribution via an iteration procedure, and a recursive scheme to calculate the first two moments. It is noted that we have to select embedded Markov points based on the service beginning epochs instead of the service completion epochs adopted for most of M/G/1 queueing analyses. Through the queue-length analysis, we obtain a decomposition form for the LST of the waiting time in each queue having the exhaustive service.      

An approximate analysis of a cyclic server queue with limited service and reservations

In this paper, we examine a queueing problem motivated by the pipeline polling protocol in satellite communications. The model is an extension of the cyclic queueing system withM-limited service. In this service mechanism, each queue, after receiving service on cyclej, makes a reservation for its service requirement in cyclej + 1. The main contribution to queueing theory is that we propose an approximation for the queue length and sojourn-time distributions for this discipline. Most approximate studies on cyclic queues, which have been considered before, examine the means only. Our method is an iterative one, which we prove to be convergent by using stochastic dominance arguments. We examine the performance of our algorithm by comparing it to simulations and show that the results are very good.     

E-供应链竞争下自营品牌商的第三方零售渠道引入与定价策略

基于电商平台销售渠道的多样性,决策是否引入第三方零售渠道是自营品牌商在现实的E-供应链竞争中常常面临的重要难题。在多渠道竞争环境下,构建由两个自营品牌商和一个电商平台组成的E-供应链系统。考虑品牌商不引入、单一品牌商引入与两个品牌商均引入第三方零售渠道三种情形,分别建立Stackelberg博弈模型并求解,分析了平台佣金、消费者的自营零售渠道偏好和交叉价格弹性系数等因素对第三方零售渠道引入及E-供应链各成员最优策略的影响。研究表明:不同的交叉价格弹性系数和消费者自营渠道偏好对第三方零售渠道引入策略具有差异性,且两个品牌商均引入第三方零售渠道对电商平台最有利。此外,平台佣金、消费者自营渠道偏好和交叉价格弹性系数对自营、第三方商品的定价以及电商平台、品牌商的利润具有重要影响。