The Value of Category Captainship in the Presence of Manufacturer Competition

This research investigates the value of category captainship (a management practice in which a retailer relies on a manufacturer for recommendations regarding strategic category management decisions) in retail supply chains. We consider a setting where the scope of category management is limited to assortment decisions and demand enhancing activities. We assume that the retailer selects a category captain among multiple competing manufacturers with privately known capabilities for driving category traffic. First, we consider a benchmark scenario where the retailer is responsible for category management. Then, we consider the category captainship scenario where the retailer selects one of the manufacturers as a captain to manage the category. We find that captainship is more likely to emerge in categories where the cost of managing variety, the retail margins, and the competition for captainship are moderate and the captain is more capable of driving traffic compared to the retailer. In such categories the collaboration between the retailer and the captain ensures sufficient surplus for both parties. Finally, we show that captainship can also benefit the non‐captain manufacturers.     

零售货架的线性补贴策略与供应链协调

考虑由一个供应商和一个零售商构成的供应链,供应商提供零售商单一产品,零售阶段的市场需求量随机地依赖于零售商的货架展示量。由于货架空间的稀缺,零售商的成本为非线性的成本函数以符合实际的情况。如果零售商在观察到需求之前决定货架空间,货架补贴可以提高渠道效率;如果零售商在观察需求之后,进行货架决策,补贴降低了供应链效率。由于零售商的努力水平可以验证,供应商可以使用回购加零售货架的线性补贴策略协调供应链,但是需要考虑零售阶段的库存决策与货架分配的决策顺序,而采取完全不同的协调方式。最后通过数值算例说明了所得结论。     

不同货架空间分配顺序下农产品供应链优化问题研究

货架是超市和生鲜便利店的重要资源，不仅具有储存和展示农产品的功能，同时货架空间大小对农产品的销量具有重要影响。针对产品需求受货架空间与零售价格共同影响的两级农产品供应链，在考虑供应商主导和零售商主导的情况下，分别对零售商在销售季节来临前和来临后分配货架空间四种分散式农产品供应链的最优决策与利润进行了分析，并与一体化供应链的最优决策进行了比较。研究发现，不论是在供应商主导还是在零售商主导的农产品供应链中，零售商在销售季节来临前分配货架空间，相比在销售季节来临后分配货架空间，农产品的批发价格与零售价格更高，分配的货架空间更小，供应商和零售商均获得更少的利润，相应的农产品供应链整体利润更少。因此，零售商在销售季节来临后分配货架空间对农产品供应链更有利。相比一体化供应链，分散式供应链的零售价格更高，分配的货架空间更小，供应链整体利润小于一体化供应链的最优利润，本文给出了基于利润共享与成本共担的合同对分散式供应链进行协调。最后，通过数值算例研究了参数变化对最优决策和供应链利润的影响。     

基于品类管理和需求外生模型的医药电商网页空间优化策略

网页空间优化对电子商务企业的绩效有着显著影响。本文结合医药品的特性,利用需求外生模型从品类管理的角度研究医药电商的网页空间优化问题,即有限网页空间内的内容优化与内容布局优化。考虑存在商品缺货以及蚕食效应的情况下,本文首先基于需求外生模型使用极大似然估计法估计了商品市场份额与商品替代率,然后提出最大市场份额指标并构建了一个加权最大市场份额最大化的整数规划模型来优化医药电商网页的内容与内容布局。通过对中国知名医药电商1药网2015年8月1日到10月31日的乙肝类抗病毒药物专栏的销售数据进行实证分析,结果表明,本模型优化的推送内容和布局顺序可以有效提高1药网各药品专栏最高至27.21%的销量,乙肝其他抗病药物专栏可以提高8.06%。研究表明,本文提出的基于最大市场份额最大化的优化模型能有效决策网页空间优化来提高医药电商的销量与市场占有率。     

Shelf Space Management When Demand Depends on the Inventory Level

Two factors that their influence on the demand has been investigated in many papers are (i) the shelf space allocated to a product and to its complement or supplement products and (ii) the instantaneous inventory level seen by customers. Here we analyze the joint shelf space allocation and inventory decisions for multiple items with demand that depends on both factors. The traditional approach to solve inventory models with a state‐dependent demand rate uses a time domain approach. However, this approach often does not lead to closed‐form expressions for the profit rate with both dependencies. We analyze the problem in the inventory domain via level crossing theory. This approach leads to closed‐form expressions for a large set of demand rate functions exhibiting both dependencies. These closed‐form expressions substantially simplify the search for optimal solutions; thus we use them to solve the joint inventory control and shelf space allocation problem. We consider examples with two products to investigate the significance of capturing both demand dependencies. We show that in some settings it is important to capture both dependencies. We consider two heuristics, each one of them ignores one of the two dependencies. Using these heuristics it seems that ignoring the dependency on the shelf space might be less harmful than ignoring the dependency on the inventory level, which, based on computational results, can lead to profit losses of more than 6%. We demonstrate that retailers should use their operational control, e.g., reorder point, to promote higher demand products.     

Managing Retail Shelf and Backroom Inventories When Demand Depends on the Shelf‐Stock Level

Inventory displayed on the retail sales floor not only performs the classical supply function but also plays a role in affecting consumers’ buying behavior and hence the total demand. Empirical evidence from the retail industry shows that for some types of products, higher levels of on‐shelf inventory have a demand‐increasing effect (“billboard effect”) while for some other types of products, higher levels of on‐shelf inventory have a demand‐decreasing effect (“scarcity effect”). This suggests that retailers may use the amount of shelf stock on display as a tool to influence demand and operate a store backroom to hold the inventory of items not displayed on the shelves, introducing the need for efficient management of the backroom and on‐shelf inventories. The purpose of this study is to address such an issue by considering a periodic‐review inventory system in which demand in each period is stochastic and depends on the amount of inventory displayed on the shelf. We first analyze the problem in a finite‐horizon setting and show under a general demand model that the system inventory is optimally replenished by a base‐stock policy and the shelf stock is controlled by two critical points representing the target levels to raise up/drop down the on‐shelf inventory level. In the infinite‐horizon setting, we find that the optimal policies simplify to stationary base‐stock type policies. Under the billboard effect, we further show that the optimal policy is monotone in the system states. Numerical experiments illustrate the value of smart backroom management strategy and show that significant profit gains can be obtained by jointly managing the backroom and on‐shelf inventories.     

Delegation vs. Control in Supply Chain Procurement under Competition

This paper studies the optimal component procurement strategies of two competing OEMs selling substitutable products. The OEMs outsource their production to a common contract manufacturer, who in turn needs an input from a component supplier. Each OEM may either directly procure the input from the component supplier, or delegate the procurement task to the contract manufacturer. We first analyze the OEMs' procurement game under a non‐strategic supplier whose component price is exogenously given. It is found that symmetric equilibria arise for most situations, that is, both OEMs either control or delegate their component procurement in equilibrium. Interestingly, despite the commonly‐held belief that the contract manufacturer would be worse off as OEMs gain component procurement control, we show that the contract manufacturer may enjoy a higher profit. Then we study the OEMs' procurement game under a strategic supplier who can set its component price. We find that the supplier's strategic pricing behavior plays a critical role in the equilibrium procurement structure. In particular, in the equilibrium under strategic supplier, the larger OEM always uses delegation while the smaller OEM may use either delegation or control. By identifying the driving forces behind the OEMs' procurement choices, this research helps explain observed industry practices and offer useful guidelines for firms' component sourcing decisions.     

非对称信息下供应链应急管理和信息价值研究

研究了非对称信息下供应链在突发事件下的应急管理和信息价值问题。当供应链生产计划已经完成后,突发事件发生并导致零售商所面临的市场需求规模以及供应商的生产成本同时发生突变,而且这些突变信息对于供应链成员而言是非对称的。分析了非对称信息对应急管理的影响以及相应的管理对策,发现非对称信息下的最优生产量不超过对称信息下的最优生产量,导致供应链系统收益减少并产生了信息价值,分析了非对称信息下供应链系统的信息价值规律以及影响因素。最后给出数值算例说明了信息在供应链中的重要价值,同时也说明了突发事件情况下实施应急管理的必要性和重要性。     

面向资金约束供应商的供应链内部融资——股权还是债权?

通过制造商向供应商提供投资或借款,可以减少由于供应商资金不足无法正常组织生产引起的制造商及供应链利润的损失,分析了股权和债权两种融资模式下制造商的最优融资与供应商的最优生产决策,并比较了供应链绩效.结论表明:供应商一定会接受债权融资,但只有在一定条件下才会接受股权融资;在股权融资模式下,要将资金约束供应商的生产恢复到无资金约束下的最优水平,需要供应商的初始资金低于一定的临界值且制造商分享供应商的利润份额超过一定的临界值;在债权融资模式下,要将资金约束供应商的生产恢复到无资金约束下的最优水平,则需要供应商的初始资金超过一定的临界值;从制造商和供应链整体的视角,在供应商自有资金少时实行股权融资模式,并且增加制造商分享的利润份额,而在供应商自有资金多时实行债权融资模式是最优策略.最后通过算例对结论进行了验证.     

Revenue‐Sharing vs. Wholesale‐Price Contracts in Assembly Systems with Random Demand

Assembly and kitting operations, as well as jointly sold products, are rather basic yet intriguing A decentralized supply chains, where achieving coordination through appropriate incentives is very important, especially when demand is uncertain. We investigate two very distinct types of arrangements between an assembler/retailer and its suppliers. One scheme is a vendor‐managed inventory with revenue sharing, and the other a wholesale‐price driven contract. In the VMI case, each supplier faces strategic uncertainty as to the amounts of components, which need to be mated with its own, that other suppliers will deliver. We explore the resulting components' delivery quantities equilibrium in this decentralized supply chain and its implications for participants' and system's expected profits. We derive the revenue shares the assembler should select in order to maximize its own profits. We then explore a revenue‐plus‐surplus‐subsidy incentive scheme, where, in addition to a share of revenue, the assembler also provides a subsidy to component suppliers for their unsold components. We show that, by using this two‐parameter contract, the assembler can achieve channel coordination and increase the profits of all parties involved. We then explore a wholesale‐price‐driven scheme, both as a single lever and in combination with buybacks. The channel performance of a wholesale‐price‐only scheme is shown to degrade with the number of suppliers, which is not the case with a revenue‐share‐only contract.