When to Lock the Volatile Input Price? Procurement of Commodity Components Under Different Pricing Schemes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shi Chen ◽  
Junfei Lei ◽  
Kamran Moinzadeh
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Problem Definition ◽  
Optimization Approach ◽  
Input Price ◽  
Standard Contract ◽  
Ordering Policy ◽  
Pricing Scheme ◽  
Market Driven ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Pricing Schemes

Problem definition: We study a two-stage supply chain, where the supplier procures a key component to manufacture a product and the buyer orders from the supplier to meet a price-sensitive demand. As the input price is volatile, the two parties enter into either a standard contract, where the buyer orders just before the supplier starts production, or a time-flexible contract, where the buyer can lock a wholesale price in advance. Moreover, we consider three selling-price schemes: Market Driven, Cost Plus, and Profit Max. Academic/practical relevance: This problem is motivated by real practices in the cloud industry. Our model and optimization approach can address similar problems in other industries as well. Methodology: We assume that the input price follows a geometric Brownian motion. To determine the optimal ordering time, we propose an optimization approach that is different from the classic approach by Dixit et al. ( 1994 ) and Li and Kouvelis ( 1999 ). Our approach leads to deeper analytical results and more transparent ordering policy. Through a numerical experimentation, we compare profitability of different parties under different contracts, pricing schemes, and market conditions. Results: The buyer’s ordering policy is determined by a threshold policy based on the current time and input price; the optimal threshold depends on not only the drift and volatility of the input price but also, their relative magnitude. The supplier’s optimal procurement time should be determined by analyzing a trade-off between the holding cost of storing the components and the future input-price movement. Managerial implications: Under the Profit-Max and the Cost-Plus pricing schemes, the time-flexible contract is a Pareto improvement compared with the standard contract, whereas under the Market-Driven pricing scheme, the supplier may be better off under the standard contract. Moreover, although the most favorable scenario for the buyer is under the Profit-Max pricing scheme, the most favorable scenario for the supplier oftentimes is under the Cost-Plus pricing scheme. Furthermore, this study provides valuable insights into impacts of various characteristics of the component market, such as the trend and volatility of the input price, on the expected profit of the supply chain and its split between the two parties.

scholarly journals Did the Introduction of Carbon Tax in Australia Affect Housing Affordability?

2013 ◽  
Vol 869-870 ◽  
pp. 840-843
Author(s):  
Xin Janet Ge
Keyword(s):  
Risk Factors ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
Energy Consumption ◽  
Tax Policy ◽  
Carbon Tax ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
Greenhouse Emissions ◽  
Pricing Scheme ◽  
The Cost ◽  
The Impact

The Australian carbon pricing scheme (carbon tax) was introduced and became effective on 01 July 2012. The introduction of the carbon tax immediately increases the cost of electricity to a number of industries such as manufacturing and construction. Households were also affected as a result of these costs been passed through the supply chain of the affected industries. The carbon tax policy was introduced to addresses greenhouse emissions and energy consumption in Australia. However, the carbon tax policy may have introduced a number of economic risk factors to the Australian housing market, in particular the impact of housing affordability.

Sharing Manufacturer’s Demand Information in a Supply Chain with Price and Service Effort Competition

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yunjie Wang ◽  
Albert Y. Ha ◽  
Shilu Tong
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Wholesale Price ◽  
Problem Definition ◽  
Theoretic Model ◽  
Price Distortion ◽  
Demand Information ◽  
Private Demand ◽  
The Cost ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Share Information

Problem definition: This paper investigates the issue of sharing the private demand information of a manufacturer that sells a product to retailers competing on prices and service efforts. Academic/practical relevance: In the existing literature, which ignores service effort competition, it is known that demand signaling induces an informed manufacturer to distort the wholesale price downward, which benefits the retailers, and so, they do not have any incentive to receive the manufacturer’s private information. In practice, many manufacturers share demand information with their retailers that compete on prices and service efforts (e.g., demand-enhancing retail activities), a setting that has not received much attention from the literature. Methodology: We develop a game-theoretic model with one manufacturer selling to two competing retailers and solve for the equilibrium of the game. Results: We show how an informed manufacturer may distort the wholesale price upward or downward to signal demand information to the retailers, depending on the cost of service effort, the intensity of effort competition, and the number of uninformed retailers. We fully characterize the impact of such wholesale price distortion on the firms’ incentive to share information and derive the conditions under which the manufacturer shares information with none, one, or both of the retailers. We derive conditions under which a higher cost of service effort makes the retailers or the manufacturer better off. Managerial implications: Our results provide novel insights about how service effort competition impacts the incentives for firms in a supply chain to share a manufacturer’s private demand information. For instance, when the cost of effort is high or service effort competition is intense, a manufacturer should share information with none or some, but not all, of the retailers.

Unraveling Behavioral Ordering: Relative Costs and the Bullwhip Effect

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brent B. Moritz ◽  
Arunachalam Narayanan ◽  
Chris Parker
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Information Sharing ◽  
Human Behavior ◽  
Bullwhip Effect ◽  
Problem Definition ◽  
Supply Chain Costs ◽  
Cost Impact ◽  
Managerial Implications ◽  
The Cost ◽  
The Impact

Problem definition: We study the bullwhip effect and analyze the impact of human behavior. We separate rational ordering in response to increasing incoming orders from irrational ordering. Academic/practical relevance: Prior research has shown that the bullwhip effect occurs in about two-thirds of firms and impacts profitability by 10%–30%. Most bullwhip mitigation efforts emphasize processes such as information sharing, collaboration, and coordination. Previous work has not been able to separate the impact of behavioral ordering from rational increases in order quantities. Methodology: Using data from a laboratory experiment, we estimate behavioral parameters from three ordering models. We use a simulation to evaluate the cost impact of bullwhip behavior on the supply chain and by echelon. Results: We find that cost increases are not equally shared. Human biases (behavioral ordering) at the retailer results in higher relative costs elsewhere in the supply chain, even as similar ordering by a wholesaler, distributor, or factory results in increased costs within that echelon. These results are consistent regardless of the behavioral models that we consider. The cognitive profile of the decision maker impacts both echelon and supply chain costs. We show that the cost impact is higher as more decision makers enter a supply chain. Managerial implications: The cost of behavioral ordering is not consistent across the supply chain. Managers can use the estimation/simulation framework to analyze the impact of human behavior in their supply chains and evaluate improvement efforts such as coordination or information sharing. Our results show that behavioral ordering by a retailer has an out-sized impact on supply chain costs, which suggests that upstream echelons are better placed to make forecasting and replenishment decisions.

scholarly journals Centralized and Decentralized Warehouse Logistics Collaboration

2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 812-831 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shiman Ding ◽  
Philip M. Kaminsky
Keyword(s):  
Lower Bound ◽  
Transportation Cost ◽  
Problem Definition ◽  
Cost Ratio ◽  
Computational Studies ◽  
Practical Relevance ◽  
Grocery Industry ◽  
Ordering Policy ◽  
Managerial Implications ◽  
The Cost

Problem definition: We bound the value of collaboration in a decentralized multisupplier multiretailer setting, where several suppliers ship to several retailers through a shared warehouse, and outbound trucks from the warehouse contain the products of multiple suppliers. Academic/practical relevance: In an emerging trend in the grocery industry, multiple suppliers and retailers share a warehouse to facilitate horizontal collaboration, lower transportation costs, and increase delivery frequencies. Thus far, these so-called mixing and consolidation centers are operated in a decentralized manner, with little effort to coordinate shipments from multiple suppliers with shipments to multiple retailers. Facilitating collaboration in this setting would be challenging (both technically and in terms of the level of trust that would be necessary), so it is useful to understand the potential gains of collaboration. Methodology: We extend the classic one-warehouse multiretailer analysis to incorporate multiple suppliers and per-truck outbound transportation cost from the warehouse and develop a cost lower bound on centralized operation as benchmark. We then analyze decentralized versions of the system, in which each retailer and each supplier maximizes his or her own utility in a variety of settings, and we analytically bound the ratio of the cost of decentralized to centralized operation to bound the loss resulting from decentralization. Results: We find analytical bounds on the performance of several decentralized policies. The best, a decentralized zero-inventory ordering policy, has a cost ratio when compared with a lower bound on the centralized policy of no more than 3/2. In computational studies, we find that costs of decentralized policies are even closer to those of centralized policies. Managerial implications: Easy-to-implement decentralized policies are efficient and effective in this setting, suggesting that centralization (and thus a potentially complex and expensive coordination effort) is unlikely to result in significant benefits.

scholarly journals Bit Error Rate (BER) QoS Attribute in Solving Wireless Pricing Scheme on Single Link Multi Service Network

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 236
Author(s):  
Irmeilyana Irmeilyana ◽  
Fitri Maya Puspita ◽  
Indrawati Indrawati ◽  
Rahayu Tamy Agustin
Keyword(s):  
Bit Error Rate ◽  
Error Rate ◽  
Wireless Internet ◽  
Service Network ◽  
Pricing Scheme ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Improved Model ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Pricing Schemes

Pricing schemes were set up on multi service network of wireless internet pricing scheme to proposed models applying Bit Error Rate QoS attribute due to requirements for ISP to maximize revenue and provide high quality of service to end users.The model was deigned by improving the original model together with added parameters and variables to the model of multi- service network by setting the base price (α) and premium quality (β) as variables and parameters. LINGO 11.0 were applied to help finding the solution. The results show that the improved models yield maximum revenue for ISP by applying the improved model by setting up a variable α and β as constant as well as by increasing the cost of all the changes in QoS. The QoS attriute BER is proven to achieve the ISP’s goal to maximize the revenue.

Sub-Supplier's Decision Affect Supply Chain Performance

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-32
Author(s):  
Manoj Kumar
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Transfer Pricing ◽  
Supply Chain Coordination ◽  
Careful Consideration ◽  
Performance Comparison ◽  
Variable Cost ◽  
Supply Chain Performance ◽  
Pricing Scheme ◽  
Pricing Schemes ◽  
The Impact

This paper studies how transfer pricing schemes interact with sub suppliers' opportunistic behaviors to affect supply chain performance. Effective supply chain management requires careful consideration of sub-suppliers', especially with respect to transfer pricing issues. Firms increasingly approach their sub-suppliers to drive compliance with firms' defined transfer pricing schemes. The paper models the supply chain incorporating asymmetric information among all the parties, supplier's innovation activities, sub suppliers' corruption possibility, and transfer pricing schemes. It examines the impact of various transfer pricing schemes on supply chain efficiency. Specifically, it conducts a performance comparison between the variable-cost transfer pricing scheme and the full-cost transfer pricing scheme. The paper finds that the sub supplier's choice of a transfer pricing scheme affects the supplier's sourcing decisions and the supply chain performance, and the variable-cost transfer pricing scheme performs better in achieving supply chain coordination. Therefore, the present research seeks to explore and increase one's understanding of critical factors that contribute to overcome aforementioned complexities and unique challenges of managing sub-suppliers for transfer pricing schemes. The present research expands on the theory of transfer pricing schemes and sub-supplier management context.

Inventory optimization considering the vehicle capacity and specifics of cash flows at rental storage sites

2020 ◽  
pp. 77-90
Author(s):  
V.D. Gerami ◽  
I.G. Shidlovskii
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Inventory Management ◽  
Sufficient Conditions ◽  
Cash Flows ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Cargo Capacity ◽  
Special Modification ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Necessary And Sufficient ◽  
Vehicle Capacity

The article presents a special modification of the EOQ formula and its application to the accounting of the cargo capacity factor for the relevant procedures for optimizing deliveries when renting storage facilities. The specified development will allow managers to take into account the following process specifics in the format of a simulated supply chain when managing inventory. First of all, it will allow considering the most important factor of cargo capacity when optimizing stocks. Moreover, this formula will make it possible to find the optimal strategy for the supply of goods if, also, it is necessary to take into account the combined effect of several factors necessary for practice, which will undoubtedly affect decision-making procedures. Here we are talking about the need for additional consideration of the following essential attributes of the simulated cash flow of the supply chain: 1) time value of money; 2) deferral of payment of the cost of the order; 3) pre-agreed allowable delays in the receipt of revenue from goods sold. Developed analysis and optimization procedures have been implemented to models of this type that are interesting and important for a business. This — inventory management systems, the format of which is related to the special concept of efficient supply. We are talking about models where the presence of the specified delays for the outgoing cash flows allows you to pay for the order and the corresponding costs of the supply chain from the corresponding revenue on the re-order interval. Accordingly, the necessary and sufficient conditions are established based on which managers will be able to identify models of the specified type. The purpose of the article is to draw the attention of managers to real opportunities to improve the efficiency of inventory management systems by taking into account these factors for a simulated supply chain.

A study of cane supply benefits associated with ad hoc mechanical harvesting to mitigate cutter absenteeism

2013 ◽  
pp. 532-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muhammad Kadwa ◽  
Carel N Bezuidenhout
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
South African ◽  
Ad Hoc ◽  
Sugar Mill ◽  
The South ◽  
Optimum Performance ◽  
Kwazulu Natal ◽  
Cane Quality ◽  
The Cost

The Eston Sugar Mill is the newest in the South African KwaZulu-Natal sugar belt. Like most other mills, it can be argued that there are inefficiencies in the supply chain due to systematic issues, which reduce optimum performance. It was alleged that mill processes are slowed, or stopped, on Sundays, Mondays, as well as some Tuesdays and Wednesdays, due to pay-weekends, because of the associated cutter absenteeism. This increases the length of the milling season (LOMS), increases milling costs and reduces the average cane quality for the season. Data on cane deliveries to the Eston Mill, over a period of five seasons, were analysed to study the magnitude of the problem. It was statistically verified that cane shortages occur immediately after payweekends and it was conservatively estimated that cutter absenteeism occurs between 25–29 days per season, which increases the LOMS by six to ten days. The associated cost of this problem equated to an average of US$159,500 (approximately EUR120,000) per milling season. In this paper, an alternative harvesting system scenario is suggested, assuming that mechanical harvesters be used after a pay-weekend, to mitigate the impacts of cutter shortages. However, the solution is calculated to be risky. When the cost of new equipment was considered, only two of the five seasons were able to justify the associated costs.

scholarly journals Evaluating the Economic Viability of Agricultural Pellets to Supplement the Current Global Wood Pellets Supply for Bioenergy Production

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (8) ◽  
pp. 2263
Author(s):  
Mahmood Ebadian ◽  
Shahab Sokhansanj ◽  
David Lee ◽  
Alyssa Klein ◽  
Lawrence Townley-Smith
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Wood Pellets ◽  
Logistics System ◽  
Global Marketplace ◽  
Biomass Logistics ◽  
Production And Distribution ◽  
The Cost

In this study, an inter-continental agricultural pellet supply chain is modeled, and the production cost and price of agricultural pellets are estimated and compared against the recent cost and price of wood pellets in the global marketplace. The inter-continental supply chain is verified and validated using an integration of an interactive mapping application and a simulation platform. The integrated model is applied to a case study in which agricultural pellets are produced in six locations in Canada and shipped and discharged at the three major ports in Western Europe. The cost of agricultural pellets in the six locations is estimated to be in the range of EUR 92–95/tonne (CAD 138–142/tonne), which is comparable with the recent cost of wood pellets produced in small-scale pellet plants (EUR 99–109/tonne). The average agricultural pellet price shipped from the six plants to the three ports in Western Europe is estimated to be in a range of EUR 183–204 (CAD 274–305/tonne), 29–42% more expensive that the average recent price of wood pellets (EUR 143/tonne) at the same ports. There are several potential areas in the agricultural pellet supply chains that can reduce the pellet production and distribution costs in the mid and long terms, making them affordable supplement to the existing wood pellet markets. Potential economic activities generated by the production of pellets in farm communities can be significant. The generated annual revenue in the biomass logistics system in all six locations is estimated to be about CAD 21.80 million. In addition, the logistics equipment fleet needs 176 local operators with a potential annual income of CAD 2.18 million.

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