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     

Stochastic production capacity: A bane or a boon for quick response supply chains?

The quick response (QR) system that can cope with demand volatility by shortening lead time has been well studied in the literature. Much of the existing literature assumes implicitly or explicitly that the manufacturers under QR can always meet the demand because the production capacity is always sufficient. However, when the order comes with a short lead time under QR, availability of the manufacturer's production capacity is not guaranteed. This motivates us to explore QR in supply chains with stochastic production capacity. Specifically, we study QR in a two-echelon supply chain with Bayesian demand information updating. We consider the situation where the manufacturer's production capacity under QR is uncertain. We first explore how stochastic production capacity affects supply chain decisions and QR implementation. We then incorporate the manufacturer's ability to expand capacity into the model. We explore how the manufacturer determines the optimal capacity expansion decision, and the value of such an ability to the supply chain and its agents. Finally, we extend the model to the two-stage two-ordering case and derive the optimal ordering policy by dynamic programming. We compare the single-ordering and two-ordering cases to generate additional managerial insights about how ordering flexibility affects QR when production capacity is stochastic. We also explore the transparent supply chain and find that our main results still hold.     

模拟体系对抗价值链的网络同步模型

描述战斗毁伤"规模效应"的Lanchester模型默认作战体系内部是"完美的"。本文扬弃此假设,首次从作战体系内部"共识"涌现的视角提出了一个模拟体系对抗价值链的网络"同步效应"模型,研究了战场变化、个体/群体认知、自同步与对抗均衡等概念的网络拓扑和权值演化形式,并发现在对抗均衡条件下无标度网络具有"同步脆弱性"。     

基于风险控制的装备供应链网络设计模型

针对风险管理中的装备供应链正向（供应）网络设计问题，在对装备供应链风险和成本进行量化分析的基础上，综合考虑风险和成本2方面因素，建立了基于风险控制的装备供应链网络设计优化模型。并设计了遗传算法对模型进行求解，给出在指定风险水平下最优设计方案与总成本。最后通过实例分析和计算，结果表明，该优化模型合理、有效、可行。     

Data-driven research in retail operations—A review

We review the operations research/management science literature on data-driven methods in retail operations. This line of work has grown rapidly in recent years, thanks to the availability of high-quality data, improvements in computing hardware, and parallel developments in machine learning methodologies. We survey state-of-the-art studies in three core aspects of retail operations—assortment optimization, order fulfillment, and inventory management. We then conclude the paper by pointing out some interesting future research possibilities for our community.