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.     

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.     

Simultaneous production of market‐specific and global products: A two‐stage stochastic program with additional demand after recourse

This paper analyzes the simultaneous production of market‐specific products tailored to the needs of individual regions and a global product that could be sold in many regions. We assume that the global product costs more to manufacture, but allows the decision concerning the allocation of products to regions to be delayed until after the manufacturing process has been completed. We further assume that there is additional demand after the region allocation but prior to delivery, extending the two‐stage stochastic program with recourse to include additional stochastic demand after the recourse. This scenario arises, for example, when there is additional uncertainty during a delivery delay which might occur with transoceanic shipments. We develop conditions for optimality assuming a single build‐allocate‐deliver cycle and stochastic demand during both the build and deliver periods. The optimal policy calls for the simultaneous production of market‐specific and global products, even when the global product is substantially more costly than the market‐specific product. In addition, we develop bounds on the performance of the optimal policy for the multicycle problem. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 50: 438–461, 2003     

When to commit in a serial supply chain with forecast updating

Negotiations between an end product manufacturer and a parts supplier often revolve around two main issues: the supplier's price and the length of time the manufacturer is contractually held to its order quantity, commonly termed the “commitment time frame.” Because actual demand is unknown, the specification of the commitment time frame determines how the demand risk is shared among the members of the supply chain. Casual observation indicates that most manufacturers prefer to delay commitments as long as possible while suppliers prefer early commitments. In this paper, we investigate whether these goals are always in the firm's best interest. In particular, we find that the manufacturer may sometimes be better off with a contract that requires an early commitment to its order quantity, before the supplier commits resources and the supplier may sometimes be better off with a delayed commitment. We also find that the preferred commitment time frame depends upon which member of the supply chain has the power to set their exchange price. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2003     

某型履带车辆液压助力变速操纵系统仿真

应用AMESim软件对某型履带车辆液压助力变速系统建立仿真模型,调整系统中部分参数为模型注入故障信息,对系统进行了故障仿真,获得了系统异常动态特性与系统元件故障之间的联系,为该系统的故障诊断提供了参考依据。结果证明该仿真模型可模拟实际系统的故障响应。     

Benders decomposition with alternative multiple cuts for a multi‐product closed‐loop supply chain network design model

In this article, we consider a multi‐product closed‐loop supply chain network design problem where we locate collection centers and remanufacturing facilities while coordinating the forward and reverse flows in the network so as to minimize the processing, transportation, and fixed location costs. The problem of interest is motivated by the practice of an original equipment manufacturer in the automotive industry that provides service parts for vehicle maintenance and repair. We provide an effective problem formulation that is amenable to efficient Benders reformulation and an exact solution approach. More specifically, we develop an efficient dual solution approach to generate strong Benders cuts, and, in addition to the classical single Benders cut approach, we propose three different approaches for adding multiple Benders cuts. These cuts are obtained via dual problem disaggregation based either on the forward and reverse flows, or the products, or both. We present computational results which illustrate the superior performance of the proposed solution methodology with multiple Benders cuts in comparison to the branch‐and‐cut approach as well as the traditional Benders decomposition approach with a single cut. In particular, we observe that the use of multiple Benders cuts generates stronger lower bounds and promotes faster convergence to optimality. We also observe that if the model parameters are such that the different costs are not balanced, but, rather, are biased towards one of the major cost categories (processing, transportation or fixed location costs), the time required to obtain the optimal solution decreases considerably when using the proposed solution methodology as well as the branch‐and‐cut approach. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2007     

Optimal capacity in a coordinated supply chain

We consider a supply chain in which a retailer faces a stochastic demand, incurs backorder and inventory holding costs and uses a periodic review system to place orders from a manufacturer. The manufacturer must fill the entire order. The manufacturer incurs costs of overtime and undertime if the order deviates from the planned production capacity. We determine the optimal capacity for the manufacturer in case there is no coordination with the retailer as well as in case there is full coordination with the retailer. When there is no coordination the optimal capacity for the manufacturer is found by solving a newsvendor problem. When there is coordination, we present a dynamic programming formulation and establish that the optimal ordering policy for the retailer is characterized by two parameters. The optimal coordinated capacity for the manufacturer can then be obtained by solving a nonlinear programming problem. We present an efficient exact algorithm and a heuristic algorithm for computing the manufacturer's capacity. We discuss the impact of coordination on the supply chain cost as well as on the manufacturer's capacity. We also identify the situations in which coordination is most beneficial. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2008     

预失真技术在C波段功率放大器中的应用

文章设计了一个工作在C波段的功率放大器,并针对此放大器设计了模拟预失真电路。选用Agilent公司的ATF-21170砷化镓场效应晶体管作为模拟预失真器的非线性器件,所设计的预失真器具有结构简单、易实现、插入损耗小、三阶互调失真补偿性能较好的特点。仿真结果表明,在输出功率为1dB压缩点时,三阶互调比改善了13dB。     

基于RBF网络的滑模变结构控制在无刷直流电机伺服系统中的应用

无刷直流电动机的参数强耦合、高度非线性特性增加了对其速度控制的难度,针对这一特点,设计了一种神经网络滑模变结构速度控制器。将无刷直流电机速度伺服系统分成名义模型和不确定模型,采用状态反馈方法对名义模型进行控制,以RBF神经网络为滑模动态补偿器对不确定系统进行控制。该方法不仪具有变结构控制的抗参数摄动、抗干扰以及速度快等优点,神经网络控制的加入还有效地减弱了单纯滑模变结构控制所带来的“抖振”现象。Matlab仿真结果表明,该控制器具有良好的控制性能和鲁棒性能。     

基于动态模型的机场配电网潮流计算新方法

机场配电网因非常情况成为孤立电力系统后,配电系统的电压、潮流和频率等发生巨大变化,传统的潮流计算方法往往会出现收敛性差、计算结果与实际不相符的情况。提出的机场配电网动态潮流计算模型能有效解决此类问题,阐述了机场配电网动态潮流计算模型的构成原理、算法并给出相应算例。通过算例计算证明了动态潮流计算模型适用于计算机场配电网的潮流。