零售商退出风险的供应链冲击与协调契约分析

零售商退出会导致供应链合作关系的终止,冲击供应链合作运营的基础,供应链企业需要合作应对吗?本文以数量折扣契约下的协调供应链为研究框架,研究存在零售商退出风险时传统数量折扣契约的供应链运作,并构建改进契约下的供应链协调模型。通过理论推演与仿真分析发现,零售商退出风险对供应链运作可能造成巨大的冲击,同时也惊讶地发现,虽然数量折扣契约在冲击下不能协调运作,但运作效率非常高。建议契约调整成本不高的供应链可选择我们改进后的协调数量折扣契约。     

感知的创业激情、 信任与员工创新行为关系研究

实践中, 制造商可通过商业保险策略降低因零部件质量问题造成的经济损失.然而, 商业保险购买成本较高且可能导致供应商轻视质量问题, 放弃质量改进.为此, 本文基于完全信息下单周期两级供应链的采购合约决策模型, 研究制造商如何利用商业保险管理供应链质量风险的问题.通过比较研究, 找出商业保险策略的实施条件, 并给出最优采购合约及商业保险策略.研究结果表明: (1) 当供应商的企业规模较小、抗风险能力较低时, 商业保险策略可完全消除风险承受能力对双方交易的制约, 促进双方达成交易; (2) 当供应商的企业规模较大、抗风险能力较高时, 制造商可利用商业保险策略降低零部件采购价格, 提高期望利润; (3) 在商业保险策略下, 制造商的最优商业保险策略是全额投保; (4) 商业保险的实施不一定造成零部件质量水平的下降.当质量成本或供应商的风险承受能力较低时, 商业保险策略与质量改进之间具有互补效应.当风险承受能力和质量成本均比较高时, 商业保险策略与质量改进之间具有替代效应.     

两种激励条件下三级供应链产品质量控制策略研究

本文基于四阶段Stackelberg博弈分析,研究了在三级供应链中如何进行产品质量控制策略问题。构建了由制造商、零售商与最终顾客组成的三级供应链博弈模型,制造商进行产品质量决策,即生产高质量产品或者低质量产品,零售商进行产品采购决策和零售定价决策,最终顾客根据两种产品质量水平和零售价格的差异,决定产品的购买数量;当零售商采购高质量产品时,制造商将会向其提供价格折扣策略;当零售商采购低质量产品时,制造商将会向其提供延迟付款策略。运用最优化原理,求解了制造商的产品质量水平、价格折扣、延迟付款期限和零售商的零售价格、最终顾客的购买数量,及期望收益函数。进行了算例分析,结果表明:高质量产品零售价格关于价格折扣下降幅度更大,而低质量产品零售价格关于延迟付款期限下降幅度更大;制造商提供的价格折扣越大、延迟付款期限越长,其期望收益将会减少,此时零售商的期望收益将会增加,最终顾客产品需求量将会增加;制造商的总期望收益函数将呈现"倒U"型,求解了期望收益的最大值及各契约参数的值,结果证明所提出的产品质量控制策略是可行的。     

Supply Chain Strategies and International Tax Arbitrage

What motivates the geographic footprint of the supply chains that multinational firms (MNFs) deploy? Traditional research in the operations and supply chain management literature tends to recommend locations primarily based on differentials in production costs and the ramifications of physical distance ignoring the role of taxation. MNFs that strategically position parts of their supply chains in low‐tax locations can allocate the profits across the divisions to improve post‐tax profits. For the profit allocation to be defensible to tax authorities, the divisional operations must possess real decision authority and bear meaningful risks. Generally speaking, the greater the transfer of risk and control, the larger the allowable allocation of profit. These transfers may also create inefficiencies due to misalignment of business goals and attitudes toward risk. We model these trade‐offs in the context of placing in a low‐tax region a subsidiary that oversees product distribution (as a limited risk distributor commissionnaire, limited risk distributor, or fully fledged distributor). Our analysis demonstrates that the MNF's preferences regarding the operating structures are not necessarily an obvious ordering based on the amount of risk and decision authority transferred to the division in the low‐tax jurisdiction. We derive and analyze threshold values of the performance parameters that describe the main trade‐offs involved in selecting an operating structure. We find some of the optimal decisions to exhibit interesting non‐monotone behavior. For instance, profits can increase when the tax rate in the low‐tax jurisdiction increases. Numerical analysis shows that the Limited‐Risk Distributor structure is rarely optimal and quantifies when each alternative dominates it.     

部分信息下生鲜农产品采购外包问题研究

针对生鲜农产品的固有属性导致的采购风险，以及企业将一些业务如物流、采购等外包给第三方物流企业（3PL，Third Party Logistics），从而专注于自身核心业务发展的现实，建立了零售商和3PL的博弈模型，对比分析了部分需求信息下3PL采购和零售商采购对零售商和3PL的最优决策、利润，以及供应链系统利润的影响。研究表明，当正向需求风险较大时，3PL对生鲜农产品实际需求的判断较准确；当需求风险较小时，零售商对生鲜农产品实际需求的判断较准确。研究还发现，在绝大部分情况下，3PL采购对供应链系统是不利的。只有当正向需求风险很大，或生鲜农产品损耗率非常大，或损失分担比例很高时，3PL采购才能够增加供应链系统的利润。然而，在3PL采购提高供应链系统利润的条件下，3PL的利润低于同等条件下零售商采购时的利润。建议此时零售商通过采取返还给3PL一定利润的方式来促使3PL同意参与采购管理，以增加零售商、3PL和供应链系统的利润，提高供应链的竞争力。     

NEGOTIATED TRANSFER PRICING AND CONFLICT RESOLUTION IN ORGANIZATIONS

An experiment was conducted to test hypotheses about conflict related to negotiated transfer pricing. A business game with repeated decision periods was used to simulate transfer pricing negotiations between corporate divisions. When the evaluation of division executives emphasized corporate profits rather than divisional profits, there was more smoothing and integrative problem solving and less aggressive-competitive behavior, relations between the divisions were better, and more cooperation was observed to occur in other decisions unrelated to the transfer pricing. Moreover, corporate profits from the transfer product and its derivative product tended to be larger. All of these effects were most pronounced when the transfer product was important to both divisions as a source of profits.     

On the evaluation of commonality strategy in product line design: The effect of valuation change and distribution channel structure

This paper investigates a manufacturer's optimal decisions in relation to the adoption of the commonality strategy in a decentralized channel as opposed to a centralized channel. Our model, through valuation premium and discount, captures the possible changes in the perceived quality made by customers as a result of the use of common design in the high-quality and low-quality products. We show that commonality always help reduce the extent of quality distortion encountered by the low-valuation segment, regardless of the channel structure. We also show that the adoption of commonality strategy in a decentralized channel is able to reduce channel efficiency loss, which may lead to improvements in the channel profits even when there is no cost saving associated with the use of common components. The valuation premium and discount are influential on several important measure including optimal quality levels, channel profits, and consumer surplus. Furthermore, we point out an important issue on the coordination between the manufacturer and the retailer that must be addressed if the commonality strategy is to be implemented in a decentralized channel.     

考虑不同经营模式的零售商纵向整合策略选择:前向,后向还是不整合？

随着互联网的发展,"新零售"表现形式之一的纵向整合成为零售商转型升级的重要策略。考虑了产品之间竞争性,分别研究了分销模式、平台模式和混合模式下,零售商采取不进行纵向整合、前向整合和后向整合的利润,通过对比给出零售商最优的纵向整合策略选择条件。最后,分析了不同经营模式对零售商纵向整合策略选择的影响。研究发现：第一,随着潜在需求的增加,在三种经营模式下零售商的最优策略都从不进行纵向整合变为后向整合、前向整合;第二,随着产品之间竞争程度增加,在分销模式和平台模式下,零售商的最优策略从后向整合变为不进行纵向整合、前向整合,在混合模式下,零售商的最优策略从后向整合或不进行纵向整合变为前向整合;第三,随着佣金费率增加,在平台模式下,零售商的最优策略从前向整合变为后向整合、不进行纵向整合,在混合模式下,零售商的最优策略从前向整合或后向整合制造商2变为不进行纵向整合、后向整合制造商1。     

具有网络外部性的双寡头市场的动态定价策略

本文通过将消费者对网络大小的预期引入消费者的效用函数,刻画了消费者预期如何影响市场潜量。然后,通过微分对策,分析了在垄断竞争的市场结构中的厂商如何在考虑到消费者对今后的预期时,如何动态的决定自己的价格和相应的策略。结果表明,随着消费者对网络增长预期的增大,将导致更大的网络规模和更低的初始价格。寡头的利润受消费者对其产量的预期的影响。     

Stimulating Early Adoption of New Products through Channel Disintegration

Conventional wisdom holds that adding layers to a distribution channel is detrimental to the interests of consumers and the channel that serves them. In contrast, our study indicates that a disintegrated channel structure can be desirable in some instances. When consumers have valuation uncertainty prior to consuming a product, having an independent retailer may boost both channel profits and consumer surplus relative to direct selling by an integrated firm. The quandary in selling such products is that after early adopters make their purchase decisions, the seller may alter prices in such a way that makes early adopters' decisions appear suboptimal in hindsight. Since the seller cannot credibly commit to future prices, customers are reluctant to adopt early, choosing instead to delay their purchase decisions. This delay is certainly detrimental to the interest of the distribution channel, but the rejection of the early adoption discount can equally reduce consumer surplus. This problem can be mitigated by introducing an independent retailer. The familiar double marginalization “problem” from channel disintegration can credibly assure customers of unfavorable future prices for late adoption. This assurance attracts more customers to seek early adoption, leading to lower overall retail prices, increased supply, and higher consumer and producer surpluses.     

考虑捐赠行为的食品动态定价策略研究

由于质量控制不当和库存过多导致的浪费是企业管理易腐食品面临的主要挑战。针对当前食品浪费严重的问题，建立考虑变质率的动态定价模型，研究捐赠行为下单一定价、两次定价与多级折扣定价三种定价策略对食品企业最优决策的影响。通过数值分析，发现捐赠行为能够提升企业利润且在多级折扣定价策略下效果更为显著，但当折扣次数较少时，单一定价策略对考虑捐赠的企业而言更优；食品最初质量、变质率、打折时间点、捐赠时间点、税收返回比率均是影响企业定价决策的重要因素；若质量差异越大，企业在多级折扣定价策略下的利润会减少，而考虑捐赠行为会使得企业利润呈上升趋势；在变质率越高时，考虑捐赠的单一定价策略会降低企业的利润，但对多级折扣定价策略下的利润影响不大；当折扣时间越接近于捐赠时间点时，基于捐赠行为的多级折扣定价策略会更优；当捐赠时间点越接近于保质期时，考虑捐赠的价格策略会优于不考虑捐赠时的价格策略。此外，研究还表明增加税收返回比率对考虑捐赠下的定价策略不一定是有利的。     

消费者寻求多样化与厂商折扣定价竞争

在很多市场环境中，消费者喜欢尝试不同产品的特性，重复消费同一商品会产生滞留成本。本文通过构建两期动态博弈模型，研究了滞留成本对企业折扣券定价行为的影响，并与其他定价策略的市场绩效进行了比较。本文研究结果表明：（1）企业会通过折扣券奖励忠诚的消费者，即企业会对重复购买自己产品的消费者给予价格优惠，而对新消费者制定高价格；（2）在均衡中，随着滞留成本的提升，消费者剩余和社会总福利降低，企业利润上升；（3）与其他定价机制相比较，折扣券定价策略下的社会总福利较低，政策制定者应当限制此类策略的应用。     

Coordinating Production and Marketing with Dynamic Transfer Prices

Decentralized decision making is a fact in the modern business world accompanied by extensive research that looks into its consequences for overall firm profits. We study the interactions of decentralized marketing and operations divisions in a corporation and explore their impact on overall firm profits in the case with and without coordination of the two decentralized units. We assume that the marketing department is responsible for the price that influences the demand (sales), and the operations department is responsible for the production rate. We allow for backlogging over time. We model the interdependence involving marketing and operations decisions as a non‐cooperative differential game, with the two divisions as strategically interacting players. We find that, without coordination, strategic interactions of marketing and production result in inefficiencies that can quantitatively be substantial. Next, we introduce a dynamic transfer pricing scheme as a coordination device and evaluate if it establishes efficient (first best and fully coordinated) outcomes. We show that if production and marketing play a game with pre‐commitment strategies, there exists a dynamic transfer price that efficiently (fully) coordinates decentralized decision making and hence results in Pareto‐efficient company profits. If the two decentralized divisions play a game without pre‐commitment, dynamic transfer prices can partially coordinate decentralized decision making but fail to fully eliminate overall inefficiencies arising from strategic interactions among decentralized divisions.     

风险偏好信息非对称下的供应链寄存契约研究

分析了寄存契约下,供应商损失规避程度对供应商生产量及供应链中成员利润的影响,进一步考虑损失规避信息为对称和非对称情况下,损失规避程度对供应链中成员利润的影响,以及对零售商而言风险态度信息的价值。研究发现,供应链中成员利润为损失规避程度的减函数,信息对称情况下供应链中成员利润要优于非对称信息情况下。最后,基于信号博弈探讨供应商风险偏好信息的揭示机制,证明信号博弈的分离均衡和混同均衡的存在,为供应商的决策提供了科学的指导。     

A Model of Utility Smoothing

Experimental studies have found that a decision maker prefers spreading good and bad outcomes evenly over time. We propose, in an axiomatic framework, a new model of discount factors that captures this preference for spread. The model provides a refinement of the discounted utility model while maintaining dynamic consistency. The derived discount factors incorporate gain/loss asymmetry recursively: the difference between average future utility and current utility defines a gain or a loss, and gains are discounted more than losses. This notion of utility smoothing can induce a preference for spread: if bad outcomes are concentrated on future periods, moving one of the bad outcomes to today would be beneficial because such an operation eliminates a large loss and replaces it with a small gain.     

具有两阶段生产模式和需求信息更新的供应链契约研究

针对二级供应链,在基于Stackelberg博弈的批发价契约中,分析了折扣价格与零售商最优提前订购量的关系及对契约双方期望收益的影响;设计了价格折扣与回购联合的协调契约,分析了供应链系统的最优提前生产量、供应链协调条件及协调契约下制造商和零售商的期望收益变化,并在协调契约不满足制造商的个体理性约束时,提出采用不对称Nash谈判模型设计两阶段生产与订购的回购契约,在保证供应链系统整体绩效最优的条件下,使制造商和零售商利润都能得到满意增长。研究表明,三级供应链实行两阶段订购的必要条件是分销商与零售商的最优提前订购量相等,与二级供应链相比,价格折扣契约下三级供应链效率更低,但价格折扣与回购联合的契约同样能协调三级供应链,该协调契约满足零售商与分销商激励相容约束。     

基于绩效的产品维修服务合同最优设计与比较分析——考虑零部件过期的影响

基于绩效的合同 (Performance-based Contracts-PBC) 是近年来在产品售后维修服务领域出现的全新商业模式。PBC 改变了传统上供应商通过提供维修活动和销售零件获取收益的方式，将供应商最终实现的产品可用率作为客户付款的标准。在 PBC 模式下，供应商以提高产品可用率为目标，其运营管理决策需要重新审视。备件库存对维修服务十分重要，直接影响故障修复时间。而零部件过期会影响备件库存的正常补货，降低产品可用率。本文基于 Stackelberg 博弈框架，建立了两种不同惩罚机制PBC合同的供应链动态博弈模型，得出了供应商的最优合同设计方案和用户的最优产品订购批量，分析了博弈均衡策略之间的相互作用，探讨了备件过期应对策略对供应链成员最优利润的影响。结果表明，不同的惩罚机制会对供应链成员的决策产生不同的影响。相对于基于备件缺货数量的惩罚机制，基于用户停机损失的惩罚机制对供应商提高产品可用率具有更加强烈的激励效应。然而，这种惩罚机制会导致供应商对备件库存过度投资，并减少用户的产品购买数量，进而会降低供应链成员的最优利润。同时，一个有意思的结果是在基于备件缺货数量的惩罚机制下，供应链均衡状态中惩罚金额与批发价格有联动特征，使得罚金的大小不会对产品订单数量和备件库存数量产生单独的影响。     

Economic Evaluation of Scale Dependent Technology Investments

We study the effect of financial risk on the economic evaluation of a project with capacity decisions. Capacity decisions have an important effect on the project̂s value through the up‐front investment, the associated operating cost, and constraints on output. However, increased scale also affects the financial risk of the project through its effect on the operating leverage of the investment. Although it has long been recognized in the finance literature that operating leverage affects project risk, this result has not been incorporated in the operations management literature when evaluating projects. We study the decision problem of a firm that must choose project scale. Future cash flow uncertainty is introduced by uncertain future market prices. The firm's capacity decision affects the firm's potential sales, its expected price for output, and its costs. We study the firm's profit maximizing scale decision using the CAPM model for risk adjustment. Our results include that project risk, as measured by the required rate of return, is related to the inverse of the expected profit per unit sold. We also show that project risk is related to the scale choice. In contrast, in traditional discounted cash flow analysis (DCF), a fixed prescribed rate is used to evaluate the project and choose its scale. When a fixed rate is used with DCF, a manager will ignore the effect of scale on risk and choose suboptimal capacity that reduces project value. S/he will also misestimate project value. Use of DCF for choosing scale is studied for two special cases. It is shown that if the manager is directed to use a prescribed discount rate that induces the optimal scale decision, then the manager will greatly undervalue the project. In contrast, if the discount rate is set to the risk of the optimally‐scaled project, the manager will undersize the project by a small amount, and slightly undervalue the project with the economic impact of the error being small. These results underline the importance of understanding the source of financial risk in projects where risk is endogenous to the project design.     

阿米巴经营模式下面向定制需求的生产线管理机制设计

为了应对在线定制订单在数量、质量、交货期等方面的需求以及生产线各阶段产出的随机性,生产商可基于阿米巴经营模式设计车间管理机制。将生产线各工序划分为n个相对独立的阿米巴组织,相邻阿米巴进行定价和交易。考虑承诺交货期对产出合格率及总成本的影响,分散决策下,基于产出不足惩罚机制构建包含计划投产量及承诺交货期决策的斯坦伯格博弈模型。集中决策下,基于资源共享机制构建包含n个决策变量的非线性优化模型,通过计算n阶HESSE矩阵的k阶主子式证明最优解的存在性及唯一性。基于惩罚成本及现货市场采购成本共担机制实现针对各个阿米巴的绩效分配及激励。在算例分析的基础主要得出如下结论：随着各阶段投产量的增大,各阿米巴及整体期望利润先上升后下降;给予客户的延期交货价格折扣越大,对于前n-1个阿米巴可能越有利,但对于最后一个阿米巴及整体可能越不利;合格率的波动性越大,各阿米巴及整体期望利润越低。基于阿米巴经营的车间管理机制设计、产出合格率影响因素的考虑、n级供应链的博弈协调等具有理论和实践价值。     

Discount Rates in Risk Versus Money and Money Versus Money Tradeoffs

We use data from a survey of residents of five Italian cities conducted in late spring 2004 to estimate the discount rates implicit in (1) money versus future risk reductions and (2) money versus money tradeoffs. We find that the mean personal discount rate is 0.3-1.7% in (1) and 8.7% in (2). The latter is lower than the discount rates estimated in comparable situations in many recent studies, greater than market interest rates in Italy at the time, and exhibits modest variation with age and gender. The discount rate implicit in money versus risk tradeoffs is within the range of estimates from studies in the United States and Europe, and does not depend on observable individual characteristics. We use split samples to investigate whether a completely abstract risk reduction - one where the risk reduction delivery has been stripped of all specifics, so that respondents should focus on the risks without being distracted by details - results in WTP and discount figures comparable to those from an identified delivery mechanism (a medical test). We find that while WTP for an immediate risk reduction is 42-73% higher with the abstract risk reduction, the discount rate in the money versus risk tradeoffs and the variance of the error term in the WTP equation are the same across the two variants of the questionnaire.