The impact of operational decisions on the design of salesforce incentives

When facing high levels of overstock inventories, firms often push their salesforce to work harder than usual to attract more demand, and one way to achieve that is to offer attractive incentives. However, most research on the optimal design of salesforce incentives ignores this dependency and assumes that operational decisions of production/inventory management are separable from design of salesforce incentives. We investigate this dependency in the problem of joint salesforce incentive design and inventory/production control. We develop a dynamic Principal‐Agent model with both Moral Hazard and Adverse Selection in which the principal is strategic and risk‐neutral but the agent is myopic and risk‐averse. We find the optimal joint incentive design and inventory control strategy, and demonstrate the impact of operational decisions on the design of a compensation package. The optimal strategy is characterized by a menu of inventory‐dependent salesforce compensation contracts. We show that the optimal compensation package depends highly on the operational decisions; when inventory levels are high, (a) the firm offers a more attractive contract and (b) the contract is effective in inducing the salesforce to work harder than usual. In contrast, when inventory levels are low, the firm can offer a less attractive compensation package, but still expect the salesforce to work hard enough. In addition, we show that although the inventory/production management and the design of salesforce compensation package are highly correlated, information acquisition through contract design allows the firm to implement traditional inventory control policies: a market‐based state‐dependent policy (with a constant base‐stock level when the inventory is low) that makes use of the extracted market condition from the agent is optimal. This work appears to be the first article on operations that addresses the important interplay between inventory/production control and salesforce compensation decisions in a dynamic setting. Our findings shed light on the effective integration of these two significant aspects for the successful operation of a firm. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 61: 320–340, 2014     

基于数据站场的系统效能评估决策支持方法

随着信息技术的发展,系统信息量的提升给军事系统效能评估带来了新的问题。针对系统效能分析数据非线性、高维数、强耦合的特点,提出了一种基于数据站场技术的效能评估决策支持方法。通过数据恢复、约减、求精与重构操作,对评估数据进行了处理,并搭建了数据站场立方体,降低了数据间的依赖性,满足了不同层面系统分析的需求。以面向任务的网络化火控系统的为例,进行了系统效能评估、时效性评估和指标分析,从三个层次验证了方法的有效性与可行性。将数据挖掘技术应用到仿真系统效能评估决策中,获得了更广泛的应用。     

考虑弹体动态特性的机动效率约束导引律

针对考虑交会角和过载约束导引律在大机动时能量损失大的问题,提出一种考虑导弹机动效率的多约束制导律。应用最优二次型原理推导出考虑一阶弹体延迟的时变导引系数闭环次优制导形式,将导弹机动时刻阻力系数引入时变权系数,并通过迭代确定机动效率约束边界。将时变约束表示成剩余时间与弹体延迟时间的函数,代入制导指令,进行弹道仿真。结果表明,对于常值与机动目标,文中制导律与过载约束导引律同只考虑交会角约束的导引律相比,对目标均能实现末端弹道成型要求,而考虑机动效率的制导指令分配更为合理,在避免指令加速度饱和的同时有效降低了拦截末端速度损耗,提高制导精度与毁伤效果。且该制导律中时变权系数无须配平求解,在保证精度的同时极大地提高了迭代速度。     

Index policies for the routing of background jobs

Arriving (generic) jobs may be processed at one of several service stations, but only when no other (dedicated) jobs are waiting there. We consider the problem of how to route these incoming background jobs to make best use of the spare service capacity available at the stations. We develop an approximative approach to Whittle's proposal for restless bandits to obtain an index policy for routing. The indices concerned are increasing and nonlinear in the station workload. A numerical study testifies to the strong performance of the index policies developed. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2004     

Dynamic inventory and pricing models for competing retailers

We address infinite‐horizon models for oligopolies with competing retailers under demand uncertainty. We characterize the equilibrium behavior which arises under simple wholesale pricing schemes. More specifically, we consider a periodic review, infinite‐horizon model for a two‐echelon system with a single supplier servicing a network of competing retailers. In every period, each retailer faces a random demand volume, the distribution of which depends on his own retail price as well as those charged by possibly all competing retailers. We also derive various comparative statics results regarding the impact several exogenous system parameters (e.g., cost or distributional parameters) have on the equilibrium decisions of the retailers as well as their expected profits. We show that certain monotonicity properties, engrained in folklore as well as in known inventory models for centralized systems, may break down in decentralized chains under retailer competition. Our results can be used to optimize the aggregate profits in the supply chain (i.e., those of the supplier and all retailers) by implementing a specific wholesale pricing scheme. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2004.     

灾害应急反应建模与仿真

为了满足多智能体应急反应仿真的需求,首先对构建多智能体应急反应仿真模拟框架的复杂性进行了分析,在此基础上提出并设计了组件式仿真模拟框架.采用本体(Ontology)建模、语义网模型及产生式规则推理等理论方法构建了仿真模拟框架的场景建模模块、人员Agent建模模块等组件.最后对依照上述研究内容所开发的原型系统进行了测试,对测试结果进行了分析,结果表明该框架能够有效满足多智能体应急反应仿真的建模需求.     

起重机吊重摆角的产生机理与动态仿真研究

针对吊重二自由度摆角非线性动力学模型,研究了起重机吊重摆角的产生机理和摆角的影响因素。起重机小车和大车同时做加（减）速的复合运动时,产生吊重二自由度摆角,摆角的大小受起升绳长度和小车运行加（减）速度大小的影响。动态仿真表明：小车运行加（减）速度对摆角的影响比绳长度显著;小车起动和制动时,吊重做受迫摆动;当小车加（减）速度增大l倍时,吊重摆角约增大0．12rad,摆速约增大0．164rad／s;当绳长度增加2m时,摆角和摆速无明显变化,吊重自由摆动的周期约增加1．3s。     

弹载星敏感器应用方案比较研究

简述了弹载星敏感器几种应用方案的原理,从视场大小、导航星等、观星方式、像元分辨率、三轴姿态精度、动态性能、惯性基准误差分离等方面分析、比较了各种方案的优缺点.除平台方案外,捷联星图方案和单(双)星方案的技术参数相当,动态性能均有待提高.星图方案较单(双)星方案在2个方面占优势:一是星图方案不要求调整星敏感器光轴对准导航星,星跟踪算法等技术能快速识别星图;二是星图方案可同时、连续观测6～8颗星,解算出弹体三轴姿态,可以采用先进的滤波技术准确地分离惯性基准误差.     

翼栅绕流流场数值模拟及动力性能研究

基于2D不可压缩定常流动的控制方程,对5个NACA4412非对称翼型组成的平面直列翼栅绕流流场进行了数值模拟,对比分析了同一翼型在翼栅中工作和单独绕流时的升、阻力情况,验证了翼栅装置工作的可行性,反映了翼栅绕流的客观规律性。结果表明:翼栅翼型头部流速和压力急剧变化,尾部出现流涡尾迹,前部是负压区,后部是正压区,内部流速大,压力小;在1/3弦长附近翼栅翼型表面压力出现拐点,拐点之前翼型上下表面压力差较大,拐点之后翼型上下表面压力差较小;翼栅内部流场具有相似、相近性,外部流场差异性较大;翼型的压力差是产生升力的主要原因。     

基于最优刚性编队分布式生成算法

为了描述一类特殊的刚性图,给出最优刚性图的概念。在保持队形时,最优刚性图可以减少拓扑图的复杂性。为了最大可能地减少队形通信的复杂性,研究了最优刚性编队的生成理论。首先,提出了4个命题,用以论证基于分布式的最优刚性生成方算法的可行性;其次,基于这些命题,提出了一种多智能体系统的编队算法;最后,通过仿真来验证所提算法的有效性。