A Decision-Making Framework for Inventory Positioning in an Omnichannel Business Environment

Author(s):  
Albert Wee Kwan Tan ◽  
David Gligor

Omnichannel is an evolving business model that has been gaining increased popularity among retailers. This business model allows firms to use a variety of channels to interact with their customers and fulfill their orders. Customers can order online and pick up later in the store, or they can choose to have the products delivered from a nearby store. Due to the complexity of fulfilling customer orders via omnichannel models, positioning inventory is a key challenge in supporting this type of business model. This article presents a framework for assisting companies in deciding under what condition to centralize or decentralize their inventory to fulfill customer orders without disrupting the shopping experience.

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 76-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshin John ◽  
Sushil Kumar

The decision making process for shipbreaking is complicated and is dependent on multiple factors. However, due to the vastly unorganized nature of shipbreaking industry in major shipbreaking locations, there is little work done to the best of the authors' knowledge, wherein these factors are mapped, weighed and integrated in the form of a comprehensive decision making framework. In recent years, although there have been significant efforts by researchers to capture the process of shipbreaking and recycling in literature, a comprehensive decision support system that encapsulates the multiple criteria for shipbreaking in a quantifiable form, is yet to be developed. This paper attempts to bridge this gap, by formulating a decision making framework, particularly for selecting the shipbreaking facility and the extent of recycling subsequent to ship disassembly, using AHP methodology. The framework considers the relevant factors, and is useful not only for shipping companies and cash brokers for decision making, but also provides insights vis-à-vis the migrating pattern of shipbreaking industry, particularly from Indian subcontinent to China, as observed in the contemporary business environment.


Author(s):  
Joshin John ◽  
Sushil Kumar

The decision making process for shipbreaking is complicated and is dependent on multiple factors. However, due to the vastly unorganized nature of shipbreaking industry in major shipbreaking locations, there is little work done to the best of the authors' knowledge, wherein these factors are mapped, weighed and integrated in the form of a comprehensive decision making framework. In recent years, although there have been significant efforts by researchers to capture the process of shipbreaking and recycling in literature, a comprehensive decision support system that encapsulates the multiple criteria for shipbreaking in a quantifiable form, is yet to be developed. This paper attempts to bridge this gap, by formulating a decision making framework, particularly for selecting the shipbreaking facility and the extent of recycling subsequent to ship disassembly, using AHP methodology. The framework considers the relevant factors, and is useful not only for shipping companies and cash brokers for decision making, but also provides insights vis-à-vis the migrating pattern of shipbreaking industry, particularly from Indian subcontinent to China, as observed in the contemporary business environment.


Author(s):  
Samir Yerpude

Business strategy is all the actions and decisions taken by the management to achieve the business goals for sustaining the competitive edge. A successful business strategy determines the longevity of the organization. The strategists analyse the vision, mission, and values to frame and articulate the business strategy. Different tools such a Business Model Canvas, etc. are then used to create the business model. Once the business strategy is created, it is also equally critical to evaluate the same amidst the changing business environment. For the validation of strategies at all levels, data plays a vital role for the management to proceed with fact-based decision making. Informed decisions based on facts reduce the probability of erroneous results assisting the businesses align to the documented strategy. Strategic analytics practice creates the essential understanding about how the quantitative techniques and methods can be deployed using the structured and unstructured data that assists strategic decision making for the organization.


2021 ◽  
Vol 242 ◽  
pp. 112544
Author(s):  
Nicola Caterino ◽  
Iolanda Nuzzo ◽  
Antonio Ianniello ◽  
Giorgio Varchetta ◽  
Edoardo Cosenza

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (14) ◽  
pp. 6620
Author(s):  
Arman Alahyari ◽  
David Pozo ◽  
Meisam Farrokhifar

With the recent advent of technology within the smart grid, many conventional concepts of power systems have undergone drastic changes. Owing to technological developments, even small customers can monitor their energy consumption and schedule household applications with the utilization of smart meters and mobile devices. In this paper, we address the power set-point tracking problem for an aggregator that participates in a real-time ancillary program. Fast communication of data and control signal is possible, and the end-user side can exploit the provided signals through demand response programs benefiting both customers and the power grid. However, the existing optimization approaches rely on heavy computation and future parameter predictions, making them ineffective regarding real-time decision-making. As an alternative to the fixed control rules and offline optimization models, we propose the use of an online optimization decision-making framework for the power set-point tracking problem. For the introduced decision-making framework, two types of online algorithms are investigated with and without projections. The former is based on the standard online gradient descent (OGD) algorithm, while the latter is based on the Online Frank–Wolfe (OFW) algorithm. The results demonstrated that both algorithms could achieve sub-linear regret where the OGD approach reached approximately 2.4-times lower average losses. However, the OFW-based demand response algorithm performed up to twenty-nine percent faster when the number of loads increased for each round of optimization.


2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (6) ◽  
pp. 671-690
Author(s):  
Arunima Rana ◽  
Ravi Shankar

Research methodology The case is written using secondary data sources (namely, research documents, press information, journal articles and published interviews). Publicly declared company information has further been leveraged to augment case facts. All information sources have been duly acknowledged in the reference section. Case overview/synopsis The case is written in the backdrop of COVID-19 pandemic and its effect on the Indian retail industry, revolving around scenarios in which a multinational retailer has to decide on its long- and short-term strategy in such an economic crisis. The case story has been developed around Marks and Spencer’s retail venture in the Indian market. With the COVID-19 pandemic impacting business at various levels, with countries moving to lock down and economies shrinking to recessionary levels, one of the worst affected sectors is retail. The teaching case builds upon Mark and Spencer’s initial decision of not entering and extending its food/grocery business in India. While it remained a dominant player in Indian fashion retail for almost two decades, it needs to re-think its decision of entering food retail owing to a pandemic situation affecting its offline sales/store footfall and increasing competition from global fashion brands such as Zara and H&M that had flooded the Indian fashion retail sector. The case provides a context for students to perform environmental factor and competitor analysis for a sector, with special focus on decision making in a changing crisis scenario. Complexity academic level This case could be used in undergraduate and MBA classroom programme, across subjects such as retail management, marketing management, international business, international business environment and strategic business management. This case fits while discussing topics such as business environmental factors, competitor analysis, decision-making under crisis, market entry decision, omnichannel retail strategy, consumer behaviour and brand management.


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