The defence firm of the future

This paper offers the personal view of a senior executive in the Defence Procurement Agency about the future requirements of the defence industry’s principal UK customer. The focus here is on trying to identify the type of corporate behaviour and range of skill sets that the UK Government will need from defence suppliers, both primes and supply chain companies in the future. The concluding message from this ‘Customer View’ is that there is likely to be a continuing market for the company that specializes in delivering defence capability. It will be a company that will be looking for a long‐term relationship, with a specialist knowledge of its various national customers and a willingness to work openly and closely with them. It will be agile in its ability to bring together diverse technologies, to package them as a system and to deliver them either as hardware or as a service. Such suppliers will also need to innovate and to adapt at least as rapidly as the threats that they seek to counter.     

A 17th-century Pikeman's Armour from Antwerp

Abstract

A recent re-examination of the arms and armour collection at the British Museum has led to the identification of a 17th-century pikeman's armour clearly associated with the city of Antwerp in modern Belgium, the only example of its kind. The three pieces: a pot, breastplate and backplate, are part of a collection bequeathed to the museum by William Burges in 1881. All three pieces can be dated to circa 1635 and are stamped with the arms of Antwerp, a stylised depiction of Antwerp castle between two hands derived from the blazon of the Margrave of Antwerp. The armour is indistinguishable from contemporary Dutch production and it is unclear whether it was made in Antwerp or whether the addition of the arms simply suggests a use in the city.     

JXTA网络短链路由改进算法

JXTA为构建对等网络提供了标准化计算平台,制定一些协议和服务专门解决构建P2P网络所遇见的问题.为了改进JXTA路由查询效率低下问题,提出一种路由短链改进算法.在端点路由协议的基础上,根据小世界短链现象采用物理邻居策略将网络划分簇,簇内采用Pastry算法,簇间运用freePastry算法进行资源搜索,使长跳路由减少短链路由增加.通过仿真实验说明,算法可有效增加检索效率,减少节点间的通讯时延.     

基于方位特征序列的地雷鉴别算法

在使用低频超宽带合成孔径雷达(UWB-SAR)对地雷进行探测的过程中,根据目标电磁散射随方位角和入射角的变化特性,提出一种利用双峰间距和频率凹点特征沿方位向变化的隐马尔科夫模型(HMM)鉴别算法。该算法首先针对目标感兴趣区域(ROI)图像估计其各方位回波响应,然后利用时频原子提取时域双峰间距和频率凹点,进而得到随方位角变化的特征序列,再通过SAR工作时方位角和入射角的变化特点以及训练样本确定HMM参数,并在此基础上计算疑似目标新的特征矢量,采用马氏距离进行判别。实验结果表明了本文所提方法在目标鉴别方面的有效性。     

Should firms conceal information when dealing with common suppliers?

A firm making quantity decision under uncertainty loses profit if its private information is leaked to competitors. Outsourcing increases this risk as a third party supplier may leak information for its own benefit. The firm may choose to conceal information from the competitors by entering in a confidentiality agreement with the supplier. This, however, diminishes the firm's ability to dampen competition by signaling a higher quantity commitment. We examine this trade‐off in a stylized supply chain in which two firms, endowed with private demand information, order sequentially from a common supplier, and engage in differentiated quantity competition. In our model, the supplier can set different wholesale prices for firms, and the second‐mover firm could be better informed. Contrary to what is expected, information concealment is not always beneficial to the first mover. We characterize conditions under which the first mover firm will not prefer concealing information. We show that this depends on the relative informativeness of the second mover and is moderated by competition intensity. We examine the supplier's incentive in participating in information concealment, and develop a contract that enables it for wider set of parameter values. We extend our analysis to examine firms' incentive to improve information. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. 62:1–15, 2015     

装备项目型供应链风险控制策略

项目型供应链管理模式能有效实现装备研制过程中行为主体间的优势互补和资源的优化配置,利于供应链整体效益的提高,但各种不确定性因素会导致主体间风险传递行为的发生。为提供风险控制有效对策,通过考虑节点位置重要度和属性重要度,构建了项目型供应链节点重要度评估模型;通过衡量行为主体风险识别和风险控制的努力程度,给出了行为主体抗风险努力程度的评价方法,最后提出了一种基于节点重要度和抗风险努力程度的项目型供应链利益分配策略,该策略能有效促使行为主体主动进行风险识别和风险控制,是一种"风险共担、利益共享"的项目型供应链合作博弈策略。     

基于Petri网的指挥流程建模与优化

鉴于Petri网在企业业务流程优化与重组方面的成功运用,遂将Petri网原理应用于作战指挥流程的建模与优化,以期获得最优作战指挥流程.文中首先阐述Petri网基本原理,然后介绍指挥流程建模的Petri网模型,最后给出指挥流程优化的原则及基本模型,并利用Petri网对指挥流程进行建模和优化,结果表明Petri网理论能够明显优化作战指挥流程.提高作战指挥效率.     

Competing with channel partners: Supply chain conflict when retailers introduce store brands

Private‐label products are of increasing importance in many retail categories. While national‐brand products are designed by the manufacturer and sold by the retailer, the positioning of store‐brand products is under the complete control of the retailer. We consider a scenario where products differ on a performance quality dimension and we analyze how retailer–manufacturer interactions in product positioning are affected by the introduction of a private‐label product. Specifically, we consider a national‐brand manufacturer who determines the quality of its product as well the product's wholesale price charged to the retailer. Given the national‐brand quality and wholesale price, the retailer then decides the quality level of its store brand and sets the retail prices for both products. We find that a manufacturer can derive substantial benefits from considering a retailer's store‐brand introduction when determining the national brand's quality and wholesale price. If the retailer has a significant cost disadvantage in producing high‐quality products, the manufacturer does not need to adjust the quality of the national‐brand product, but he should offer a wholesale price discount to ensure its distribution through the retailer. If the retailer is competitive in providing products of high‐quality, the manufacturer should reduce this wholesale price discount and increase the national‐brand quality to mitigate competition. Interestingly, we find the retailer has incentive to announce a store‐brand introduction to induce the manufacturer's consideration of these plans in determining the national‐brand product quality and wholesale price. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2010     

基于MCMC方法的Lorenz混沌系统的参数估计

基于贝叶斯理论,提出用马尔科夫链蒙特卡罗(MCMC)方法来估计Lorenz混沌系统的未知参数。首先导出了未知参数分布规律的后验概率密度函数;接着采用自适应Metropolis算法构造Markov链;然后截取收敛的链序列,计算混沌系统参数的估计值。数值试验表明:该方法具有很高的估计精度,同时具有较好的抗噪声性能。     

经马氏修正的Poisson过程的极大似然估计

近年来 ,隐马氏模型成为研究相依随机变量的一个十分有用的工具。实际应用过程中的一个很重要的问题是如何对隐马氏模型的参数进行估计。将一类连续时间隐马氏模型的问题转化为离散时间隐马氏模型的问题 ,给出了具体的隐马氏模型———经马氏修正的Poisson过程的极大似然估计及其算法。此类过程被广泛用来对复杂电信网络的交通流进行建模