A spatial rank‐based multivariate EWMA control chart

Nonparametric control charts are useful in statistical process control when there is a lack of or limited knowledge about the underlying process distribution, especially when the process measurement is multivariate. This article develops a new multivariate self‐starting methodology for monitoring location parameters. It is based on adapting the multivariate spatial rank to on‐line sequential monitoring. The weighted version of the rank‐based test is used to formulate the charting statistic by incorporating the exponentially weighted moving average control scheme. It is robust to non‐normally distributed data, easy to construct, fast to compute and also very efficient in detecting multivariate process shifts, especially small or moderate shifts which occur when the process distribution is heavy‐tailed or skewed. As it avoids the need for a lengthy data‐gathering step before charting and it does not require knowledge of the underlying distribution, the proposed control chart is particularly useful in start‐up or short‐run situations. A real‐data example from white wine production processes shows that it performs quite well. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 59: 91–110, 2012     

Optimal pricing for a short life‐cycle product when customer price‐sensitivity varies over time

Technology products often experience a life‐cycle demand pattern that resembles a diffusion process, with weak demand in the beginning and the end of the life cycle and high demand intensity in between. The customer price‐sensitivity also changes over the life cycle of the product. We study the prespecified pricing decision for a product that exhibits such demand characteristics. In particular, we determine the optimal set of discrete prices and the times to switch from one price to another, when a limited number of price changes are allowed. Our study shows that the optimal prices and switching times show interesting patterns that depend on the product's demand pattern and the change in the customers' price sensitivity over the life cycle of the product. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2012     

Are non‐lethal weapons a viable military option to strengthen the hearts and minds approach in Afghanistan?

Commanders of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) have repeatedly stressed the hearts and minds approach in Afghanistan, in saying that the human terrain is decisive for a successful outcome of the mission. Avoidance of civilian casualties is considered of strategic importance, and by nature highly dependent on the management of tactical level Escalation of Force (EoF) situations. Non‐lethal weapons (NLWs) are expected to enable tactical commanders to avoid innocent civilian casualties in such situations. This article considers a selected NLW on its potential to accomplish this requirement. It uses a defence technology assessment approach to analyse EoF situations experienced by Dutch ISAF forces in which the NLW is inserted. The analysis demonstrates that a range of contextual factors in the Afghanistan high‐risk environment tend to narrow down the window of opportunity for the NLW to help defuse the risk of unintended civil casualties.     

Approximation results for min‐max path cover problems in vehicle routing

This article studies a min‐max path cover problem, which is to determine a set of paths for k capacitated vehicles to service all the customers in a given weighted graph so that the largest path cost is minimized. The problem has wide applications in vehicle routing, especially when the minimization of the latest service completion time is a critical performance measure. We have analyzed four typical variants of this problem, where the vehicles have either unlimited or limited capacities, and they start from either a given depot or any depot of a given depot set. We have developed approximation algorithms for these four variants, which achieve approximation ratios of max{3 ‐ 2/k,2}, 5, max{5 ‐ 2/k,4}, and 7, respectively. We have also analyzed the approximation hardness of these variants by showing that, unless P = NP , it is impossible for them to achieve approximation ratios less than 4/3, 3/2, 3/2, and 2, respectively. We have further extended the techniques and results developed for this problem to other min‐max vehicle routing problems.© 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2010     

Dynamic capacity reservation and due date quoting in a make‐to‐order system

We consider a make‐to‐order manufacturer facing random demand from two classes of customers. We develop an integrated model for reserving capacity in anticipation of future order arrivals from high priority customers and setting due dates for incoming orders. Our research exhibits two distinct features: (1) we explicitly model the manufacturer's uncertainty about the customers' due date preferences for future orders; and (2) we utilize a service level measure for reserving capacity rather than estimating short and long term implications of due date quoting with a penalty cost function. We identify an interesting effect (“t‐pooling”) that arises when the (partial) knowledge of customer due date preferences is utilized in making capacity reservation and order allocation decisions. We characterize the relationship between the customer due date preferences and the required reservation quantities and show that not considering the t‐pooling effect (as done in traditional capacity and inventory rationing literature) leads to excessive capacity reservations. Numerical analyses are conducted to investigate the behavior and performance of our capacity reservation and due date quoting approach in a dynamic setting with multiple planning horizons and roll‐overs. One interesting and seemingly counterintuitive finding of our analyses is that under certain conditions reserving capacity for high priority customers not only improves high priority fulfillment, but also increases the overall system fill rate. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2008     

A multi‐stage stochastic programming approach for network capacity expansion with multiple sources of capacity

In networks, there are often more than one sources of capacity. The capacities can be permanently or temporarily owned by the decision maker. Depending on the nature of sources, we identify the permanent capacity, spot market capacity, and contract capacity. We use a scenario tree to model the uncertainty, and build a multi‐stage stochastic integer program that can incorporate multiple sources and multiple types of capacities in a general network. We propose two solution methodologies for the problem. Firstly, we design an asymptotically convergent approximation algorithm. Secondly, we design a cutting plane algorithm based on Benders decomposition to find tight bounds for the problem. The numerical experiments show superb performance of the proposed algorithms compared with commercial software. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 63: 600–614, 2017     

Analytic solution for the nucleolus of a three‐player cooperative game

The nucleolus solution for cooperative games in characteristic function form is usually computed numerically by solving a sequence of linear programing (LP) problems, or by solving a single, but very large‐scale, LP problem. This article proposes an algebraic method to compute the nucleolus solution analytically (i.e., in closed‐form) for a three‐player cooperative game in characteristic function form. We first consider cooperative games with empty core and derive a formula to compute the nucleolus solution. Next, we examine cooperative games with nonempty core and calculate the nucleolus solution analytically for five possible cases arising from the relationship among the value functions of different coalitions. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2010     

Robustness of efficient server assignment policies to service time distributions in finite‐buffered lines

We study the assignment of flexible servers to stations in tandem lines with service times that are not necessarily exponentially distributed. Our goal is to achieve optimal or near‐optimal throughput. For systems with infinite buffers, it is already known that the effective assignment of flexible servers is robust to the service time distributions. We provide analytical results for small systems and numerical results for larger systems that support the same conclusion for tandem lines with finite buffers. In the process, we propose server assignment heuristics that perform well for systems with different service time distributions. Our research suggests that policies known to be optimal or near‐optimal for Markovian systems are also likely to be effective when used to assign servers to tasks in non‐Markovian systems. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2010     

Optimal switchover times between two activities utilizing the same resource

The “gold‐mining” decision problem is concerned with the efficient utilization of a delicate mining equipment working in a number of different mines. Richard Bellman was the first to consider this type of a problem. The solution found by Bellman for the finite‐horizon, continuous‐time version of the problem with two mines is not overly realistic since he assumed that fractional parts of the same mining equipment could be used in different mines and this fraction could change instantaneously. In this paper, we provide some extensions to this model in order to produce more operational and realistic solutions. Our first model is concerned with developing an operational policy where the equipment may be switched from one mine to the other at most once during a finite horizon. In the next extension we incorporate a cost component in the objective function and assume that the horizon length is not fixed but it is the second decision variable. Structural properties of the optimal solutions are obtained using nonlinear programming. Each model and its solution is illustrated with a numerical example. The models developed here may have potential applications in other areas including production of items requiring the same machine or choosing a sequence of activities requiring the same resource. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 49: 186–203, 2002; DOI 10.1002/nav.10008     

Adjacency‐based local top‐down search method for finding maximal efficient faces in multiple objective linear programming

It is well‐known that the efficient set of a multiobjective linear programming (MOLP) problem can be represented as a union of the maximal efficient faces of the feasible region. In this paper, we propose a method for finding all maximal efficient faces for an MOLP. The new method is based on a condition that all efficient vertices (short for the efficient extreme points and rays) for the MOLP have been found and it relies on the adjacency, affine independence and convexity results of efficient sets. The method uses a local top‐down search strategy to determine maximal efficient faces incident to every efficient vertex for finding maximal efficient faces of an MOLP problem. To our knowledge, the proposed method is the first top‐down search method that uses the adjacency property of the efficient set to find all maximal efficient faces. We discuss this and other advantages and disadvantages of the algorithm. We also discuss some computational experience we have had with our computer code for implementing the algorithm. This computational experience involved solving several MOLP problems with the code.