Coordinating Service‐Sensitive Demand and Capacity by Adaptive Decision Making: An Application of Case‐Based Decision Theory*

The subject of this article is the simultaneous choice of product price and manufacturing capacity if demand is stochastic and service‐level sensitive. In this setting, capacity as well as price have an impact on demand because several aspects of service level depend on capacity. For example, delivery time will be reduced if capacity is increased given a constant demand rate. We illustrate the relationship between service level, capacity, and demand reaction by a stylized application problem from the after‐sales services industry. The reaction of customers to variations in service level and price is represented by a kinked price‐demand‐rate function. We first derive the optimal price‐capacity combination for the resulting decision problem under full information. Subsequently, we focus on a decision maker (DM) who lacks complete knowledge of the demand function. Hence the DM is unable to anticipate the service level and consequently cannot identify the optimal solution. However, the DM will acquire additional information during the sales process and use it in subsequent revisions of the price‐capacity decision. Thus, this decision making is adaptive and based on experience. In contrast to the literature, which assumes certain repetitive procedures somewhat ad hoc, we develop an adaptive decision process based on case‐based decision theory (CBDT) for the price‐capacity problem. Finally, we show that a CBDT DM in our setting eventually finds the optimal solution, if the DM sets the price based on absorption costs and adequately adjusts the capacity with respect to the observed demand.     

需求受销售价格与变质时间影响的时滞变质品供应链协调研究

在由单个生产商和单个销售商组成的两级时滞变质品供应链中，销售商面临的市场需求受销售价格和物品变质时间影响。分别建立分散决策与集中决策下的时滞变质品供应链定价与补货模型，得到两种决策模式下的销售价格与订货批量均衡解。通过比较两种决策模式发现，集中决策下的销售价格更低且订货批量和预期利润更高。引入数量折扣契约对时滞变质品供应链进行协调，并借助常相对风险规避型效用函数和纳什讨价还价理论来分配协调后的预期利润增量。通过数值算例演示了决策变量求解过程，敏感性分析给出了时滞变质品特性参数变动时对决策变量产生的影响。     

考虑消费者策略行为的供应链两周期定价与契约设计

针对由一个制造商与一个零售商构成的供应链,考虑消费者的策略性跨期购买行为,构建了两周期动态博弈模型,分析了消费者策略性程度对两周期均衡结果、消费者剩余和社会福利的影响,比较了分散式与集中式决策的均衡偏差,设计了与消费者策略性程度相关的两周期收益共享契约与"两周期收益共享+转移支付"组合式契约。研究表明：分散式决策下,消费者策略性程度有利于增加消费者剩余和社会福利,但会对供应链成员不利;某些情形下,消费者策略性程度会使分散式与集中式决策的系统利润差值增大;当消费者策略性程度相对较低时,两周期收益共享契约不仅可实现供应链完美协调,还可增加消费者剩余和社会福利;当消费者策略性程度较高时,通过组合式契约可实现供应链完美协调,但此时消费者策略性程度的增强可能对消费者剩余和社会福利产生负面影响。     

零售商信息禀赋优势下制造商电商直销渠道决策

在供应链中由于零售商相比制造商掌握更多消费者信息,能够对市场需求进行预测,因此制造商在建立直销渠道决策时往往面临着市场需求信息的不对称。本文考虑一个由单个制造商和单个零售商组成的供应链,其中零售商向制造商订购产品并销售给终端市场,制造商可能建立直销渠道将产品直接销售给消费者。通过构建制造商无入侵、对称信息下和不对称信息下制造商入侵三种情形下的博弈模型,本文分析了制造商建立直销渠道决策和零售商的订货决策。研究发现,尽管零售商具有信息禀赋优势,制造商建立直销渠道总是能够获得更多的利润,并且在信息不对称情况下制造商建立直销渠道获得的利润大于在信息对称情况下获得的利润。而零售商与之相反,在制造商掌握市场预测信息的情况下零售商的收益更高,供应链总收益在对称信息的情况下最高。进一步考虑制造商按照自身信息禀赋进行备货量决策的情况,可以得到按照自身信息禀赋与零售商同时决策时制造商建立直销渠道的利润大于信息对称和信息不对称两种情况下的利润。     

Demand Growth in Services: A Discrete Choice Analysis of Customer Preferences and Online Selling

The selling of perishable services (e.g., hotel rooms, airline seats, and rental cars) online is increasingly popular with both retailers and consumers. Among the innovative approaches to online sales is opaque selling. First popularized by Priceline.com's name‐your‐own‐price model, opaque selling hides some attributes of the service (notably, brand and specific location) until after the purchase decision, in exchange for a discounted price. This means that a branded “product” is being sold as somewhat of a commodity, but the brand “name” is protected by the opaque model. The attraction of this model for retailers is that they are presumably able to increase their revenue stream, albeit at a lower rate, by selling rooms that otherwise would remain in inventory. In this article, we outline the development and analysis of an online choice survey to understand consumer preferences among three types of online distribution channels: regular full information sales channels, and opaque sales channels with or without consumer bidding. A Multinomial Logit model is employed to analyze the data and measure the consumer trade‐offs between price and other attributes of the product. We use the estimated model to calculate the incremental demand and revenue created by using an opaque channel simultaneously with regular full information channels. On balance, we find that correctly priced opaque channels can add to hotels revenue streams without undue cannibalization of regular room sales.     

产能约束下考虑消费者偏好的双渠道供应链决策与协调

制造商产能和消费者偏好均会对双渠道供应链成员决策产生影响。考虑消费者渠道和低碳双重偏好，研究产能约束下双渠道供应链成员决策与协调问题。构建集中决策和分散决策两种情形下的双渠道供应链成员决策模型，比较分析两种情形下产能约束、消费者渠道偏好和低碳偏好对供应链决策影响；设计改进的收益共享契约协调机制，证明了其有效性。研究结果表明：在集中决策和分散决策两种情形下消费者渠道偏好对供应链收益都起到促进作用，其中在集中决策下不考虑消费者渠道偏好时供应链收益最少；消费者低碳偏好程度的提高促使两渠道产品销售价格的提高，进而增加供应链收益；在分散决策下随着供应链产能的增大，网络直销渠道具有比传统零售渠道更大的销量增长幅度；设计的协调机制消除了供应链的"双重边际效应"，实现帕累托改进。最后通过算例验证以上研究结论。     

Impact of secondary market on consumer return policies and supply chain coordination

In this paper, we develop a unified model to study the inventory management problem of a product and the coordination of the associated supply chain consisting of a single supplier and considerably many retailers in the presence of a secondary market. Specifically, consumer returns are allowed in the initial sales. Then, we introduce a secondary market to salvage the returns and the leftovers from the initial sales. In this secondary market, a discount price will be offered to the consumers but no returns are accepted. Moreover, between the primary and the secondary market, there is an internal market where retailers can trade among themselves so that they are able to adjust their inventory levels to prepare for the sales in the secondary market. We study the retailers' and the supply chain's inventory decision in this case and highlight the impact of the secondary market on the sales as well as on the supply chain coordination contracts. We conclude that the secondary market helps us to increase the total wholesale volume. Numerical examples show that the total sales profit is also increased. However, the secondary market aggravates the incentive conflict between the retailers and the supply chain on deciding the optimal inventory levels and hence requires the supplier to offer more generous buyback or sales rebate contracts for coordination of the supply chain. Finally, we extend our analysis to more general cases and also show that our results are robust to some of the modeling assumptions.     

考虑消费者退货的制造商入侵策略研究

在考虑消费者退货的情形下，通过构建包括一个制造商、一个零售商和消费者的二级供应链模型，研究了订货量决策以及制造商开通直销渠道的问题。分析提供退款保证和决策顺序对均衡结果以及制造商开通直销渠道的影响。研究发现：在单一渠道供应链中，提供退款保证提高销量，制造商和零售商利润以及消费者剩余；在不提供退款保证情形下，制造商利润和零售商利润都随零售满意度递增；在提供退款保证情形下，制造商利润和零售商利润都随零售满意度先递减后递增；当直销渠道的成本较高时，制造商将不开通直销渠道；提供退款保证有利于制造商开通直销渠道。在双渠道供应链中：在顺序决策情形下，直销量随零售满意度递增，然而在同时决策情形下，直销量却随零售满意度递减；提供退款保证虽然降低零售商利润但能够提高消费者剩余，零售商利润随直销成本递增，在提供退款保证情形下，制造商利润和总利润随直销成本先递减后递增；当零售满意度较高，且直销成本也较高时，提供退款保证使制造商和零售商“双输”，当零售满意度较高，但直销成本较低时，提供退款保证使制造商和零售商达到(win-lose)。     

Production and Sales Planning in Capacitated New Product Introductions

How should a firm with limited capacity introduce a new product? Should it introduce the product as soon as possible or delay introduction to build up inventory? How do the product and market characteristics affect the firm's decisions? To answer such questions, we analyze new product introductions under capacity restrictions using a two‐period model with diffusion‐type demand. Combining marketing and operations management decisions in a stylized model, we optimize the production and sales plans of the firm for a single product. We identify four different introduction policies and show that when the holding cost is low and the capacity is low to moderate, a (partial) build‐up policy is indeed optimal if consumers are sensitive to delay. Under such a policy, the firm (partially) delays the introduction of its product and incurs short‐term backlog costs to manage its future demand and total costs more effectively. However, as either the holding cost or the capacity increases, or consumer sensitivity to delay decreases, the build‐up policy starts to lose its appeal, and instead, the firm prefers an immediate product introduction. We extend our analysis by studying the optimal capacity decision of the firm and show that capacity shortages may be intentional.     

Up Then Down: Bid‐Price Trends in Revenue Management

In the classic revenue management (RM) problem of selling a fixed quantity of perishable inventories to price‐sensitive non‐strategic consumers over a finite horizon, the optimal pricing decision at any time depends on two important factors: consumer valuation and bid price. The former is determined exogenously by the demand side, while the latter is determined jointly by the inventory level on the supply side and the consumer valuations in the time remaining within the selling horizon. Because of the importance of bid prices in theory and practice of RM, this study aims to enhance the understanding of the intertemporal behavior of bid prices in dynamic RM environments. We provide a probabilistic characterization of the optimal policies from the perspective of bid‐price processes. We show that an optimal bid‐price process has an upward trend over time before the inventory level falls to one and then has a downward trend. This intertemporal up‐then‐down pattern of bid‐price processes is related to two fundamental static properties of the optimal bid prices: (i) At any given time, a lower inventory level yields a higher optimal bid price, which is referred to as the resource scarcity effect; (ii) Given any inventory level, the optimal bid price decreases with time; that is referred to as the resource perishability effect. The demonstrated upward trend implies that the optimal bid‐price process is mainly driven by the resource scarcity effect, while the downward trend implies that the bid‐price process is mainly driven by the resource perishability effect. We also demonstrate how optimal bid price and consumer valuation, as two competing forces, interact over time to drive the optimal‐price process. The results are also extended to the network RM problems.     

Addressing Supply–Demand Imbalance: Designing Efficient Remanufacturing Strategies

The management of remanufacturing inventory system is often challenged by mismatched supply (i.e., returned units, called cores) and demand. Typically, the demand for remanufactured units is high and exceeds the supply early in a product's lifetime, and drops below the supply late in the lifetime. This supply–demand imbalance motivates us to study a switching strategy to facilitate the decision‐making process. This strategy deploys a push mode at the early stage of a product's lifetime, which remanufactures scarce cores to stock to responsively satisfy the high demand, and switches to a pull mode as the product approaches obsolescence to accurately match the low demand with supply. In addition, the strategy further simplifies the decision‐making process by ignoring the impact of leftover cores at the end of each decision period. We show that the optimal policy of the switching strategy possesses a simple, multi‐dimensional base‐stock structure, which aims to remanufacture units from the i best‐quality categories up to the ith state‐independent base‐stock level. An extensive numerical study shows that the switching strategy delivers close‐to‐optimal and robust performance: the strategy only incurs an average profit loss of 1.21% and a maximum of 2.27%, compared with the optimal one. The numerical study also shows when a pure push or pull strategy, a special case of the switching strategy, delivers good performance. The study offers the managerial insight that firms can use simple, easy‐to‐implement strategies to efficiently manage the remanufacturing inventory system.     

电子商务环境下双渠道供应链协调的补偿策略研究

构建了电子商务环境下由一个制造商与一个零售商组成的双渠道供应链模型,分析、比较了集中式决策与分散式决策下双渠道供应链的最优价格,从电子渠道与传统渠道合作的角度出发,研究了双渠道供应链协调的补偿策略,论证了这种补偿策略能够实现双渠道供应链协调,且在一定范围内可以保证双渠道供应链成员的双赢.最后通过算例分析,进一步检验了所设计的补偿策略对双渠道供应链协调的有效性.     

Forecast Updating and Supplier Coordination for Complementary Component Purchases

We study a supply chain where an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) buys subassemblies, comprised of two complementary sets of components, from a contract manufacturer (CM). The OEM provides a demand forecast at the time when the CM must order the long lead‐time set of components, but must decide whether or not to provide updated forecasts as a matter of practice. Forecast updates affect the CM's short lead‐time purchase decision, and the anticipation of updates may also affect the long lead‐time purchase decision. While the OEM and CM both incur lost sales costs, the OEM can decide whether or not to share the overage costs otherwise fully borne by the CM. We investigate when the OEM is better served by committing to provide updated forecasts and/or committing to share overage costs. For a distribution‐free, two‐stage forecast‐update model, we show that (1) the practice of providing forecast updates may be harmful to the OEM and (2) at the OEM's optimal levels of overage risk sharing, the CM undersupplies relative to the supply chain optimal quantity. For a specific forecast‐update model, we computationally investigate conditions under which forecast updating and risk sharing are in the best interest of the OEM.     

考虑退货风险的制造商双渠道供应链定价决策研究

针对事前不确定性导致的退货问题,从消费者行为出发,建立考虑定价差异和退货风险双重因素的市场需求函数,通过Stackelberg博弈模型研究四种不同市场需求情形在不同定价模式下双渠道供应链的最优决策。在数值仿真部分,对不同情形决策之间比较、供应链收益进行比较分析。研究表明：电子渠道销售价格与电子渠道的市场基本需求成正比,批发价和传统渠道销售价格与传统渠道的市场基本需求成正比,实体店体验服务水平和传统渠道的市场基本需求的关系（线性关系）则根据某些条件而定;退货风险对供应链决策的影响与定价模式、市场需求影响因素相关;制造商偏好于定价不相等模式,零售商偏好于定价相等模式;退货风险与定价差异对供应链成员收益的影响与定价模式相关,对整体供应链收益的影响与定价模式和退货率大小有关。     

销售成本信息不对称下供应商风险规避的回购契约

在价格随机条件下,销售成本信息不对称且供应商规避风险时,本文探讨回购契约协调供应链的最优决策。在前提假设的基础上构建新的回购契约模型,求解并用算例进行仿真验证,考虑信息不对称与风险规避共同发生耦合作用后对供应链相关决策变量的影响。研究结果表明：在价格随机条件下,不管信息是否对称,只要供应商有风险规避意识,供应链相关决策变量均发生分岔突变;不管市场价格是否随机,也不管供应商是否风险规避,只要零售商隐瞒私人销售成本信息,就会给自己带来额外的收益,但会给供应商与整个供应链带来损害;供应链上的信息越不对称,在分岔突变区域,相关决策变量的振荡幅度越大。分岔突变现象是市场价格随机和供应商风险规避耦合作用后特有的现象;零售商能够利用信息不对称给自己带来额外的好处,但会损害供应商和供应链的利益;供应商防范零售商这种损人利己行为的最好对策,就是通过设计一种合作机制,以最低成本的方式来促使零售商将销售成本信息公开化;另外,供应商以平稳的心态(风险中性)应对外部风险,更有利于提高其自身决策的水平。     

考虑定价和需求关系的供应链网络优化研究

本文通过引入价格-需求函数描述产品价格变化对消费者需求的影响，构建了一个由制造商、仓库和消费者组成的三级供应链网络。在此基础上，以最大化供应链总利润为目标、以定价和需求为决策变量，建立了混合整数非线性规划（MINLP）模型。基于该模型目标函数非线性的复杂性，采用外部近似法将目标函数近似线性化，即切割成有限条切线，使其可以求解。最后通过不同规模的算例分析验证了模型和算法的可行性与有效性，从而指导供应链上的企业权衡其成本和收益，提高顾客的满意度。     

Joint Initial Stocking and Transshipment—Asymptotics and Bounds

A common problem faced by many firms in their supply chains can be abstracted as follows. Periodically, or at the beginning of some selling season, the firm needs to distribute finished goods to a set of stocking locations, which, in turn, supply customer demands. Over the selling season, if and when there is a supply‐demand mismatch somewhere, a re‐distribution or transshipment will be needed. Hence, there are two decisions involved: the one‐time stocking decision at the beginning of the season and the supply/transshipment decision throughout the season. Applying a stochastic dynamic programming formulation to a two‐location model with compound Poisson demand processes, we identify the optimal supply/transshipment policy and show that the optimal initial stocking quantities can be obtained via maximizing a concave function whereas the contribution of transshipment is of order square‐root‐of T. Hence, in the context of high‐volume, fast‐moving products, the initial stocking quantity decision is a much more important contributor to the overall profit. The bounds also lead to a heuristic policy, which exhibits excellent performance in our numerical study; and we further prove both the bounds and the heuristic policy are asymptotically optimal when T approaches infinity. Extension to multiple locations is also discussed.     

Dynamic Supply Risk Management with Signal‐Based Forecast,Multi‐Sourcing,and Discretionary Selling

We examine the critical role of advance supply signals—such as suppliers’ financial health and production viability—in dynamic supply risk management. The firm operates an inventory system with multiple demand classes and multiple suppliers. The sales are discretionary and the suppliers are susceptible to both systematic and operational risks. We develop a hierarchical Markov model that captures the essential features of advance supply signals, and integrate it with procurement and selling decisions. We characterize the optimal procurement and selling policy, and the strategic relationship between signal‐based forecast, multi‐sourcing, and discretionary selling. We show that higher demand heterogeneity may reduce the value of discretionary selling, and that the mean value‐based forecast may outperform the stationary distribution‐based forecast. This work advances our understanding on when and how to use advance supply signals in dynamic risk management. Future supply risk erodes profitability but enhances the marginal value of current inventory. A signal of future supply shortage raises both base stock and demand rationing levels, thereby boosting the current production and tightening the current sales. Signal‐based dynamic forecast effectively guides the firm's procurement and selling decisions. Its value critically depends on supply volatility and scarcity. Ignoring advance supply signals can result in misleading recommendations and severe losses. Signal‐based dynamic supply forecast should be used when: (a) supply uncertainty is substantial, (b) supply‐demand ratio is moderate, (c) forecast precision is high, and (d) supplier heterogeneity is high.     

基于制造商网络渠道选择的双渠道供应链定价 与服务决策研究

本文考虑由线下零售商实体销售与制造商网络销售构成的网络直销,以及由线下零售商实体销售与线上零售商网络销售构成的网络分销两种制造商双渠道模式,研究“搭便车”行为下制造商模式选择和供应链最优定价与服务决策。研究发现:制造商的渠道选择策略与“搭便车”行为程度、消费者偏好网络渠道程度、价格敏感系数等有关。尤其当消费者受到的服务且对价格的敏感性相同时,制造商会选择网络直销双渠道模式。进一步分析消费者“搭便车”行为和网络渠道偏好对制造商渠道选择和定价决策影响发现,制造商在消费者偏好网络渠道程度比较低时应选择网络分销双渠道模式,而当消费者网络渠道偏好和“搭便车”行为程度都比较高时,制造商应选择网络直销双渠道模式。消费者网络渠道偏好或“搭便车”行为程度越大,两种模式下批发价格应设置的更低。网络直销渠道模式下“搭便车”行为程度越大,网络渠道销售价格应设置的更低,而消费者网络渠道偏好程度越大,网络渠道销售价格应设置得更高。     

Joint Mail‐In Rebate Decisions in Supply Chains Under Demand Uncertainty

We study the joint decisions of offering mail‐in rebates (MIRs) in a single‐manufacturer–single‐retailer supply chain using a game theoretic framework. Either party can offer an MIR to the end consumer if it is in his best interest. The consumer demand is stochastic and depends on the product price and the amount of MIRs. When the retail price is exogenous, we show the existence of a unique Nash equilibrium under both additive and multiplicative demand functions and characterize it completely. We show that any of the following four scenarios can be the equilibrium: both parties offer MIR, only one party offers MIR, none offers MIR. When the retail price is a decision variable for the retailer and the rebate redemption rate increases with the amount of MIR, we once again prove the existence of a unique Nash equilibrium where both the retailer and the manufacturer offer MIRs. Using a numerical study, we show that the average post‐purchase price of the product is higher not only than the perceived pre‐purchase price but also than the newsvendor optimal price without an MIR. This implies that an MIR makes a product look cheaper while the consumers actually pay more on average.