基于信息更新与服务水平约束的供应链订货及协调决策

研究由一个供应商和一个零售商及一组顾客组成的单周期供应链系统。供应商向零售商提供两次订 货机会,零售商根据第一阶段的订货情况及市场信号,对需求信息进行更新预测,确定第二阶段是否需要补货。首先,通过分析顾客购买与退货决策,确定产品的最优零售价格与退货价格。其次,对零售商的订 货策略进行研究,以两阶段利润之和最大化为目标函数,引入服务水平约束,确定了零售商第一阶段和第 二阶段的最优订货量,并探讨了市场信号和服务水平约束对零售商最优订货策略及期望利润的影响。结果表明,当目标服务水平设定较低时,零售商的订货策略与不设定服务水平约束时的情形相同;但是无论是高目标服务水平还是低目标服务水平,若二次订货时点上的市场信号为低值时,零售商无需二次订货,而若此时点的市场信号为高值时,零售商需要进行二次订货,目标服务水平的高低将对第二次的订货量产生影响。最后,证明了基于差别定价的回购契约能够实现上述供应链系统的协调。     

专利技术授权、生产外包与合同设计

专利授权及其授权协议是知识产权转化为现实生产力的关键。本文针对由一个专利技术提供商、一个品牌制造商和一个OEM组成的供应链,考虑市场需求信息不对称以及OEM存在规模经济效应,研究了专利技术提供商最优专利授权合同设计问题,考察了不对称信息、规模经济效应等因素对专利授权合同设计、供应链利润、消费者剩余和社会福利的影响。研究结果表明：在不对称信息下,专利技术提供商通过设计一组合同菜单可以有效甄别市场需求信息;OEM会有动机去提升其规模经济效应,但却不一定有利于其他供应链成员和消费者;不对称信息的存在会影响供应链成员企业的利润水平以及消费者剩余,并总是会导致供应链系统利润的损失,但若满足一定条件,则专利技术提供商与品牌制造商可以达成信息共享谈判,实现"双赢"。     

Quantity Flexibility Contracts: Optimal Decisions with Information Updates*

We study single and multiperiod quantity flexibility contracts involving one demand forecast update in each period and a spot market. We obtain the optimal order quantity at the beginning of a period and order quantities on contract and from the spot market at the then prevailing price after the forecast revision and before the demand materialization. The amount that can be purchased on contract is bounded by a given flexibility limit. We discuss the impact of the forecast quality and the level of flexibility on the optimal decisions and managerial insights behind the results.     

Optimal Quantity Discount Design with Limited Information Sharing*

In this article we address the optimal quantity discount design problem of a supplier in a two‐stage supply chain where the supplier and the buyer share annual demand information only. The supply chain faces a constant deterministic demand that is not price sensitive and operates with fixed setup costs in both stages. We show that the supplier can actually moderate a cost‐minimizing buyer to order in quantities different than the buyer's optimal order quantity in the traditional setting and develop a multi‐breakpoint quantity discount scheme that maximizes supplier's expected net savings. The proposed multi‐breakpoint discount scheme can be easily computed from the available information and, while also maximizing the supplier's net savings, is very effective in achieving high levels of supply chain coordination efficiency in the presence of limited information.     

合同订购与现货市场混合交易下的双渠道供应链优化决策

为了更好地匹配需求与供应, 提高企业收益和服务水平, 本文研究了合同订购与现货市场交易结合下的双渠道供应链优化决策问题。首先分析了单纯批发价合同订购模式下的决策, 进一步考虑现货市场单向交易及双向交易的情形, 将供应链回购合同与数量柔性合同引入单向现货市场, 建立了这两类合同订购分别与现货市场补货、现货市场卖货相结合的订购模型, 以及批发价合同订购与现货市场买卖双向交易联合的决策模型。分析了不同模式下回购价格、缺货成本、补货成本、现货价格、现货价格波动及风险偏好对订购决策的影响, 并通过算例仿真, 分析了各类现货市场的使用对销售商收益的影响。结果表明, 合同订购与双向现货市场结合可以充分利用现货市场即时交易的优势, 提高供应链效益;而合同订购与单向现货市场结合, 虽然可以通过合同提高供货水平, 降低库存积压风险, 但该情形需要考虑供应商的回购或补货价格, 销售商仍有一定风险。不论单向或双向现货市场与合同订购的联合, 均可使供应链的利润优于单纯合同订购的情形。     

考虑资金收益情况下的供应链回购契约

在制造商的资金收益率大于零售商资金收益率的情况下,以报童模型为基础,研究了资金收益对回购契约的影响.系统预期利润变为与批发价相关,利用拉格朗日方程求解了满足零售商参与约束、同时使系统和制造商预期利润取得最大值的契约参数.与不考虑资金收益情况下的供应链协调不同的是:订货批量大于相应批发价下不考虑零售商参与约束的最优订货批量;若零售商的保留利润一定,则回购价增大;回购价可以大于批发价,批发价可以小于制造商的边际生产成本.     

Flexibility or Cost Saving? Sourcing Decisions with Two Suppliers

This article studies a decentralized supply chain in which there are two suppliers and a single buyer. One supplier offers the quantity flexibility (QF) contract to the buyer, while the other offers the cheaper price. Under the QF contract, the buyer does not assume full responsibility for the forecast, yet the supplier guarantees the availability of the forecasted quantity with additional buffer inventory. On the other hand, the price‐only contract places full inventory burden on the buyer, but with a cheaper price. We study this problem from the buyer's perspective and solve for the buyer's optimal procurement and forecasting decisions. We identify areas where flexibility and cheaper price have an advantage, one over the other. Our results indicate that the buyer significantly benefits from having multiple sources of supply. We also find that, from the system's standpoint, a multisupplier system may outperform a single‐supplier supply chain under certain conditions. Interestingly, we observe that providing too much flexibility may benefit the low‐price supplier rather than benefiting the QF supplier. We discuss the managerial implications and provide directions for future research opportunities.     

Optimization and Coordination of Fresh Product Supply Chains with Freshness‐Keeping Effort

We consider a supply chain in which a distributor procures from a producer a quantity of a fresh product, which has to undergo a long‐distance transportation to reach the target market. During the transportation process, the distributor has to make an appropriate effort to preserve the freshness of the product, and his success in this respect impacts on both the quality and quantity of the product delivered to the market. The distributor has to determine his order quantity, level of freshness‐keeping effort, and selling price, by taking into account the wholesale price of the producer, the cost of the freshness‐keeping effort, the likely spoilage of the product during transportation, and the possible demand for the product in the market. The producer, on the other hand, has to determine the wholesale price based on its effect on the order quantity of the distributor. We develop a model to study this problem, and characterize each party's optimal decisions in both decentralized and centralized systems. We further develop an incentive scheme to facilitate coordination between the two parties. Computational results are reported to show the effects of freshness‐keeping efforts.     

非对称信息下双渠道供应链的定价决策

探讨在零售商的风险规避度分别为完全信息和私有信息2种情况下的供应链决策问题,比较2种情况下的最优决策值发现：制造商的直销渠道价格不受风险规避度是否信息私有的影响。制造商的最优批发价格和零售商的最优零售渠道价格随制造商掌握的风险规避度均值的变化而变化。数值算例验证了该结论,并计算存在直销渠道价格不能小于批发价格约束时的最优决策值。通过对无约束和有约束情况下最优决策值的比较表明：虽然2种情况下产品的市场销售总量不变,但约束条件的存在能够减弱直销渠道对传统零售渠道的影响。     

Hierarchical Screening for Capacity Allocation in Supply Chains: The Role of Distributors

We consider a two‐stage principal–agent screening environment in a decentralized supply chain with retailers, distributors, and a supplier. The retailers possess private information regarding their local market profitabilities. The distributors can partially observe the retailers' profitabilities and are heterogeneous with regard to the precision of that information. The supplier determines the level of production, but knows neither the local market profitabilities nor the precision of the distributors' information. The supplier first allocates finished products to distributors, and the distributors then contract with local retailers with a capacity constraint. We find that due to the distributors' superior information, the quantity distortion on the retailers' side is mitigated, and the upstream information asymmetry subsequently affects the quantity allocation among the downstream retailers. The supplier may not benefit from contracting with the distributors. In addition, no distributor is excluded based on the heterogeneity of the information precision, even though some distributors do not have better information than the supplier. In the numerical examples, we further analyze how the local market heterogeneity and inventory costs affect the capacity allocation, the retailers' payoffs, and the supply chain profits. We document some counter‐intuitive quantity allocation rules that arise from the distributors' information advantage.     

二级物流服务供应链定价及其效率研究

研究了需求不确定条件下,基于利润最大化原则的二级物流服务供应链的定价及效率问题。基于物流服务供应链中集成商市场和供应商市场的四种不同市场组合,建立了以集成商为主导的集成商与供应商之间的Stackelberg博弈模型,求得集成商的最优定价和最优订购量,比较了不同集成商和供应商市场组合下的物流服务供应链的效率高低情况。最后,进行了数值计算,得出集成商的最优定价和最优订购量,验证了不同市场组合下的物流服务供应链效率高低情况。结果表明:集成商的最优定价和最优订购量同时受集成商和供应商所处的市场环境影响;集成商市场寡头垄断、供应商市场完全竞争的情形下物流服务供应链效率最高,集成商市场垄断、供应商市场寡头垄断的情形下物流服务供应链效率最低。     

Supply Chain Management of Fresh Products with Producer Transportation*

This article considers a class of fresh‐product supply chains in which products need to be transported by the upstream producer from a production base to a distant retail market. Due to high perishablility a portion of the products being shipped may decay during transportation, and therefore, become unsaleable. We consider a supply chain consisting of a single producer and a single distributor, and investigate two commonly adopted business models: (i) In the “pull” model, the distributor places an order, then the producer determines the shipping quantity, taking into account potential product decay during transportation, and transports the products to the destination market of the distributor; (ii) In the “push” model, the producer ships a batch of products to a distant wholesale market, and then the distributor purchases and resells to end customers. By considering a price‐sensitive end‐customer demand, we investigate the optimal decisions for supply chain members, including order quantity, shipping quantity, and retail price. Our research shows that both the producer and distributor (and thus the supply chain) will perform better if the pull model is adopted. To improve the supply chain performance, we propose a fixed inventory‐plus factor (FIPF) strategy, in which the producer announces a pre‐determined inventory‐plus factor and the distributor compensates the producer for any surplus inventory that would otherwise be wasted. We show that this strategy is a Pareto improvement over the pull and push models for both parties. Finally, numerical experiments are conducted, which reveal some interesting managerial insights on the comparison between different business models.     

基于移动商务平台的供应链优化与协调研究

3G网络的普及为移动商务的进一步发展提供了广阔的平台,越来越多的企业通过开发基于移动商务平台的应用来销售产品进而扩大市场份额。本文考虑一个网络零售商和一个移动平台服务商组成的供应链系统;其中零售商借助于服务商的营销努力来开拓移动渠道需求。零售商根据平台销量向服务商支付佣金;考虑到捕获的需求所带来的网络外部性,服务商需要确定自身的营销投入。基于一个Stackelberg博弈模型,我们研究了零售商的最优佣金和服务商的最优营销努力决策,刻画了最优决策的结构性质,并提出了一个分段佣金契约来实现供应链的协调。数值实验表明通过零售商和平台服务商的协调运作,能够有效地提高整体利润。研究结果对新时期网络零售商开展基于移动商务平台的协作具有较强的管理启示。     

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.     

With or Without Forecast Sharing: Competition and Credibility under Information Asymmetry

Forecast sharing among trading partners lies at the heart of many collaborative and contractual supply chain management efforts. Even though it has been praised in both academic and practitioner circles for its critical role in increasing demand visibility, some concerns remain: The first one is related to the credibility of forecast sharing, and the second is the fear that it may turn into a competitive disadvantage and induce suppliers to increase their price offerings. In this study, we explore the validity of these concerns under a supply chain with a competitive upstream structure, focusing specifically on (i) when and how a credible forecast sharing can be sustainable, and (ii) how it impacts on the intensity of price competition. To address these issues, we develop a supply chain model with a buyer facing a demand risk and two heterogeneous suppliers competing for order allocation from the buyer. The extent of demand is known only to the buyer. The buyer submits a buying request to the suppliers via a commonly used procurement mechanism called request for quotation (RFQ). We consider two variants of RFQ. In the first type, the buyer simply shares the estimated order quantity with no further specifications. In the second one, in addition to this, the buyer also specifies minimum and/or maximum order quantities. We fully characterize equilibrium decisions and profits associated with them under symmetric and asymmetric information scenarios. Our main findings are that the buyer can use a RFQ with quantity restrictions as a credible signal for forecast sharing as long as the degree of demand information asymmetry is not too high, and that, contrary to above concerns, the equilibrium prices that emerge between competing suppliers under asymmetric information may indeed increase if the buyer cannot share forecast information credibly with its upstream partners.     

基于策略性竞争博弈的供应链信息共享策略

在供应链成员的市场信息以及成本非对称的情形下,讨论两个终端企业（一个自产自销,一个从上游批发产品）,在供应链中信息共享策略的方案,包括：信息优势企业如何根据市场需求情况确定是否信息共享（若是,则如何共享）;信息劣势企业如何根据对方透露出的市场信息来决策订货量;上游供应链如何决策批发价,从而控制整个供应链的博弈态势,使下游销售商在竞争中更为主动。经过研究发现,低市场类型时,自产自销商乐于共享信息,使竞争对手摄于低迷的市场状况从而降低订货量;在高市场类型且市场波动较小时自产自销商依然选择共享,在乐观的市场条件下表明自己的竞争优势,从而一定程度上威摄入侵者;而市场波动较大时,由于信息共享的额外收益不足以抵消信息共享需付出的额外成本,从而选择不共享信息。     

Optimizing Customer Forecasts for Forecast‐Commitment Contracts

We study a “Forecast‐Commitment” contract motivated by a manufacturer's desire to provide good service in the form of delivery commitments in exchange for reasonable forecasts and a purchase commitment from the customer. The customer provides a forecast for a future order and a guarantee to purchase a portion of it. In return, the supplier commits to satisfy some or all of the forecast. The supplier pays penalties for shortfalls of the commitment quantity from the forecast, and for shortfalls of the delivered quantity from the customer's final order (not exceeding the commitment quantity). These penalties allow differential service among customers. In Durango‐Cohen and Yano (2006), we analyzed the supplier's problem for a given customer forecast. In this paper, we analyze the customer's problem under symmetric information, both when the customer is honest and when he strategically orders more than his demand when doing so is advantageous. We show that the customer gains little from lying, so the supplier can use his control over the contract parameters to encourage honesty. When the customer is honest, the contract achieves (near‐)coordination of the supply chain in a great majority of instances, and thus provides both excellent performance and flexibility in structuring contracts.     

RFID技术压缩提前期对供应链收益的影响与协调

RFID技术能够压缩供应链的提前期,提高零售商的服务水平,同时也会增加供应链的成本,如何协调采用RFID技术后供应链成员的收益是迫切需要解决的问题。本文针对单供应商和单零售商的两级供应链,考虑提前期变化对供应链及其成员收益的影响,在假定RFID单位标签成本为一定值的情况下,研究了采用RFID技术前后分散式供应链和集中式供应链的收益,并探讨了契约参数的变化对供应链协调的影响。结果表明,收益共享契约能有效地协调采用RFID技术后的供应链,实现供应链成员的共赢,但是采用RFID技术后,能够协调供应链的契约参数的区间缩小,零售商的最优订货量减少,供应商的批发价格上升。最后得出供应链采用RFID技术后提前期压缩量的阈值,通过数值分析对结论进行了验证,该研究为供应链企业采用RFID技术提供了相应的管理启示。     

不完全信息下再制造逆向供应链的定价与协调研究

本文探讨了回收量随机情况下的单一制造商和两个零售商组成的再制造逆向供应链系统的定价策略。在完全信息下,分别得到了Stackelberg博弈和联合博弈下的可行策略集合及可行解。在不完全信息下,运用信号甄别方法及激励相容约束得到了两个最优定价合同。研究表明:定价合同可以有效避免逆向选择问题,保证回收市场的稳定性;通过签订合同,制造商和零售商的利润均有所增加;制造商可通过零售商的履约表现控制其回收量,并对未完成任务的零售商进行惩罚;高运营成本零售商会不断降低运营成本以增加利润。     

Designing Supply Contracts Considering Profit Targets and Risk

Managers at all stages of a supply chain are concerned about meeting profit targets. We study contract design for a buyer–supplier supply chain, with each party maximizing expected profit subject to a chance constraint on meeting his respective profit target. We derive the optimal contract form (across all contract types) with randomized and deterministic payments. The best contract has the property that, if the chance constraints are binding, at most one party fails to satisfy his profit target for any given demand realization. This implies that “least risk sharing,”that is, minimizing the probability of outcomes for which both parties fail to achieve their profit targets, is optimal, contrary to the usual expectations of “risk sharing.” We show that an optimal contract can possess only two of the following three properties simultaneously: (i) supply chain coordination, (ii) truth‐telling, and (iii) non‐randomized payments. We discuss methods to mitigate the consequent implementation challenges. We also derive the optimal contract form when chance constraints are incorporated into several simpler and easier‐to‐implement contracts. From a numerical study, we find that an incremental returns contract (in which the marginal rebate rate depends on the return quantity) performs quite well across a relatively broad range of conditions.