唧唧堂：POM 生产运营管理 2023年1月刊论文摘要18篇
1.按需服务定价：结合使用和接入费用的替代方法
许多公司正在采用“一切或任何东西”作为一种服务——“XaaS”模式来销售商品和增值服务。这些商品的买家在他们想要的单位数量和每个单位的估值上均不同。设计这种收入模式的供应商可以提供基于使用的单位费用或基于访问的周期费用，通常会将它们结合为一种非线性的两部分资费计划，向所有买家征收这两种类型的费用，或者让买家从单位和周期计划的菜单中自行选择。我们提出了一个理论模型来分析混合单位和周期费用的替代设计的经济影响。我们的分析得出了以下关于这些计划的盈利能力和市场覆盖率的实践见解。首先，对于销售零可变成本的数字产品的公司来说，菜单通常是将接入费和使用费结合起来的更好方式。其次，如果公司的生产环境转售或运行在后端基础设施或数据服务提供商之上，而这些基础设施或数据服务提供商会带来不可忽略的可变成本，那么首选的设计就会切换到两部分资费。第三，我们发现，当买方的边际估值变化率相对相似时，这两种设计（采用两种费用）相比仅采用一种费用的简单计划（每单位和每期间的最佳费用）的收入优势最为显著。
Many firms are adopting an “everything or anything” as a service—“XaaS”—model to sell goods and value-added services. Buyers for such goods are heterogeneous both in the number of units they desire and the valuations for each unit. Suppliers designing such revenue models can offer either a usage-based per-unit fee or an access-based per-period fee, often combining them both as a nonlinear two-part tariff plan that imposes both types of fees on all buyers or let buyers self-select from a menu of per-unit and per-period plans. We develop a theoretical model to analyze the economic implications of alternative designs for mixing per-unit and per-period fees. Our analysis produces the following practical insights on these plans' profitability and market coverage. First, the menu is generally a better way of combining access and usage fees for a firm selling digital goods with zero variable costs. Second, the preferred design switches to a two-part tariff if the firm's production environment resells or runs on top of a back-end infrastructure or data service provider that imposes nonnegligible variable costs. Third, we show that the revenue advantage of these two designs (which employ both fees) over a simple plan that employs only one fee (best of per unit and per period) is most significant when the rate of change in marginal valuation is relatively similar across buyers.
参考文献：Manish Gangwar, Hemant K. Bhargava. Pricing on-demand services: Alternative ways of combining usage and access fees. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 11-27.
2.公司应该把供应商带进董事会吗？
内部董事拥有重要的公司特定知识，可以为董事会的决策过程出谋划策。然而，主要关注董事会监督职能的监管改革，已将内部董事赶出了董事会。本文认为，具有公司和行业特定知识的供应商在填补董事会的关键空缺方面具有独特位置。此外还发现，在董事会中拥有供应商(SOTB)的价值受到公司所面临的环境突发事件的影响：运营效率、多样化和需求不确定性。通过客观衡量供应商在董事会中的存在，作者发现供应商的存在可以提高公司绩效。他们还发现，在经营效率较低和需求不确定性较高的企业中，SOTB在提高绩效方面的价值更高，而在多元化程度较高的企业中，SOTB的价值更低。这些结果对于潜在的内生性问题、替代估计方法以及调节因子和结果变量的测量具有鲁棒性。
Endowed with significant firm-specific knowledge, inside directors can contribute to the decision-making processes of the boardroom. However, regulatory changes, focusing primarily on the monitoring function of the boards, have driven inside directors out of the boardroom. This article argues that suppliers with firm- and industry-specific knowledge are uniquely positioned to fill a critical void in boardrooms. It also suggests that the value of having a supplier on the board (SOTB) is influenced by environmental contingencies faced by a firm: operational efficiency, diversification, and demand uncertainty. Using an objective measure of supplier presence in the boardroom, the authors find that a supplier's presence enhances firm performance. They also find that the value of an SOTB in enhancing performance is greater in firms with lower operational efficiency and higher demand uncertainty and, is lower in firms with higher diversification. These results are robust to potential endogeneity issues, alternative estimation methods, and measures of moderator and outcome variables.
参考文献：Saurabh Ambulkar, S. Arunachalam, Raghu Bommaraju, Sridhar Ramaswami. Should a firm bring a supplier into the boardroom?. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 28-44.
3.涉及未知截尾需求和凸库存成本的离散项目库存控制
我们研究涉及损失的销售和由此截尾的需求的库存控制。在长期平均框架中，需求分布在很大程度上是未知的。只要固定库存成本严格凸到第二个丢失项目的成本严格高于第一个时，遗憾将是$\Omega (T^{2/3})$。我们的离散项目设置已经呈现了强审查指标的存在或不存在，或者等效地，在库存耗尽后了解或不了解另一个需求请求，这是一个关键问题，任何为连续项目情况设计的基于梯度的方法都是无效的。我们提出一种策略，在指定的学习期间故意订购非常高的水平，并在剩余的学习期间使用基础库存水平，以适应学习期间形成的近经验分布。通过此策略可以实现匹配的$O(T^{2/3})$上限。即使是不易腐烂的物品，这个结果也可以成立。数值实验进一步说明了我们单独学习政策的相对竞争力。
We study inventory control involving lost sales and hence censored demand. In a long-run average framework, the demand distribution is largely unknown. As long as the stationary inventory costs are strictly convex to the extent that the second lost item costs strictly more than the first one, the regret would be $\Omega (T^{2/3})$. Our discrete-item setting has rendered the presence or absence of strong censoring indicators or equivalently, being knowledgeable or ignorant of one more demand request after the depletion of the inventory, a critical issue and any gradient-based method designed for the continuous-item case ineffective. We propose a policy that deliberately orders up to very high levels in designated learning periods and in the remaining doing periods, uses base-stock levels tailored to near-empirical distributions formed over the learning periods. A matching $O(T^{2/3})$ upper bound can be achieved by this policy. The results can hold even when items are nonperishable. Numerical experiments further illustrate the relative competitiveness of our separate learning-doing policy.
参考文献：Jian Yang, Jim (Junmin) Shi. Discrete-item inventory control involving unknown censored demand and convex inventory costs. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 45-64.
4.通过模拟优化服务系统的资源配置：贝叶斯公式
服务业在当今经济中越来越重要。为了满足人们对高质量服务日益增长的期望，有效配置资源对于服务系统平衡服务质量和成本至关重要。本文特别关注一类资源分配问题，其中服务水平目标和约束以概率度量的形式存在。此外，服务系统中的流程复杂性和系统动态性往往使其性能评估和优化具有挑战性，并依赖于仿真模型。为此，我们提出了一种具有概率测度的广义资源分配模型，并在此基础上提出了一种最优计算预算分配(OCBA)公式，以在仿真中选择受随机噪声影响的最优解。OCBA公式最小化了基于所选解决方案质量的预期机会成本。此外，该公式采用贝叶斯方法来考虑候选解决方案的先验知识和潜在性能相关性。然后，推导了公式的渐近最优性条件，并提出了相应的迭代算法。数值实验和一个以医院急诊科实际问题为灵感的案例研究，通过仿真验证了所提算法在解决资源分配问题上的有效性。
The service sector has become increasingly important in today's economy. To meet the rising expectation of high-quality services, efficiently allocating resources is vital for service systems to balance service qualities with costs. In particular, this paper focuses on a class of resource allocation problems where the service-level objective and constraints are in the form of probabilistic measures. Further, process complexity and system dynamics in service systems often render their performance evaluation and optimization challenging and relying on simulation models. To this end, we propose a generalized resource allocation model with probabilistic measures, and subsequently, develop an optimal computing budget allocation (OCBA) formulation to select the optimal solution subject to random noises in simulation. The OCBA formulation minimizes the expected opportunity cost that penalizes based on the quality of the selected solution. Further, the formulation takes a Bayesian approach to consider the prior knowledge and potential performance correlations on candidate solutions. Then, the asymptotic optimality conditions of the formulation are derived, and an iterative algorithm is developed accordingly. Numerical experiments and a case study inspired by a real-world problem in a hospital emergency department demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm for solving the resource allocation problem via simulation.
参考文献：Weiwei Chen, Siyang Gao, Wenjie Chen, Jianzhong Du. Optimizing resource allocation in service systems via simulation: A Bayesian formulation. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 65-81.
5.对战略客户的二手产品采取（不）有条件的回收政策
对于频繁发布新版本的代产品，当新版本推向市场时，当前版本通常还有剩余的使用寿命。这给公司同时管理二手产品收集和升级产品介绍带来了挑战，特别是在二级市场存在的情况下。本文提出了一个分析模型来研究两种广泛采用的二手产品收集策略的设计和评估。具体来说，根据返还二手产品的货币奖励是否与进一步购买相关，我们研究了实践中发生的无条件（回购）和有条件（以旧换新）收集政策。我们发现，在没有二级市场的情况下，当基础产品是耐用的，并且制造商在回收后可以获得的剩余价值是中间值时，有条件回收政策的表现优于无条件回收政策。然而，当存在一个独立的二级市场，并允许客户相互交易二手产品时，任何有条件的政策都不能优于最优的无条件政策。特别是，当剩余价值较低时，两种保单产生的利润相同；否则，无条件政策占主导地位，因为它通过收集更多的二手产品，减少对二级市场的供应，有效地缓解了升级产品销售的竞食。我们还讨论了这两种收集政策对环境的影响。我们的研究有助于理解战略性客户行为和二级市场对二手产品回收政策选择的影响，并为制造商设计最优的回收政策提供了指导。
For generation products characterized by frequent releases of new versions, when a new version is introduced to the market, the current version usually still has a remaining useful life. This creates a challenge for a firm to manage used product collection and upgraded product introductions at the same time, especially with the presence of a secondary market. This paper develops an analytical model to study the design and evaluation of two widely adopted collection policies for used products. Specifically, depending on whether a monetary reward for returning used products is associated with further purchases, we examine both unconditional (buyback) and conditional (trade-in) collection policies that take place in practice. We find that, in the absence of a secondary market, a conditional collection policy can outperform an unconditional one when the base product is durable and the residual value that the manufacturer can obtain after collection is intermediate.However, when an independent secondary market exists, allowing customers to trade used products with each other, any conditional policy cannot outperform the optimal unconditional policy. In particular, the two policies generate the same profit when the residual value is low;otherwise, the unconditional policy dominates as it effectively mitigates the cannibalization of the upgraded product sales by collecting more used products and reducing the supply to the secondary market. We also discuss the environmental impacts of these two collection policies. Our study helps to understand the impact of strategic customer behavior and the secondary market on the choice of used product collection policies, and provides manufacturers with guidance on the design of the optimal collection policy.
参考文献：Chang Dong, Yong Lei, Qian Liu. (Un)conditional collection policies on used products with strategic customers. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 82-97.
6.绩效反馈和生产力：来自现场实验的证据
我们的理论是，员工利用他们收到的绩效反馈来重新评估他们对自己努力的边际效益的信念，这可能会导致他们增加或减少自己的努力。为了测试我们的模型，我们在一家财富500强公司的配送中心进行了一项现场实验，在那里员工领取个人绩效工资，我们研究了两种类型的反馈，个人反馈和相对反馈。结果显示，员工对反馈内容的反应与模型一致：如果所提供的信息暗示增加努力的边际效益高，他们就会增加努力；如果他们知道增加努力的边际效益低，他们就会减少努力。此外，绩效反馈对生产率分布的低分位数影响更大。
We theorize that employees use the performance feedback they receive to reassess their beliefs about the marginal benefit of their effort, which may lead them to increase or reduce their effort.To test our model, we conduct a field experiment at the distribution center of a Fortune 500 firm where employees receive individual performance pay, and we study two types of feedback, individual and relative. The results show that employees react to feedback content in a way that is consistent with the model: They increase their effort if the information provided implies that the marginal benefit of increasing effort is high and decrease it if they learn that it is low. Moreover, performance feedback has a greater impact on the lower quantiles of the distribution of productivity.
参考文献：Amrou Awaysheh, Rocio Bonet, Jaime Ortega. Performance feedback and productivity: Evidence from a field experiment. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 98-115.
7.建模过时的医疗用品捐赠对受援国的影响
大多数发达国家都有大量医疗物资储备，以备应急之需。由于高昂的处理成本和偏远的储存地点，这些库存通常不用于日常运营。因此，储备供应(没有使用)期满是一个重大问题。解决这种浪费的一个可行办法是向发展中国家捐赠大量过时的医疗用品，这些国家的卫生系统往往没有足够的医疗用品。在这里，我们重点关注个人防护装备(PPE)和类似产品，这些产品与时效和安全相关的风险较低。然而，国际社会对捐赠过时的医疗用品持谨慎态度，世界卫生组织明确建议不要捐赠。安全问题虽然重要，但并不是主要的问题，因为最近的研究表明，过期日期是保守的。相反，最令人担忧的是对受援国的宏观影响。以安全为前提，我们仔细模拟了医疗用品捐赠供应链中的激励机制，从而深入了解腐败可能产生的影响和对当地行业的影响。总体而言，我们发现捐赠对捐赠产品质量的影响并不是单调的。特别是，质量略低于当地市场产品质量的过期捐赠可能比新鲜捐赠更有益；因此，我们建议国际社会重新考虑其关于禁止从日期已定的储备捐赠的立场。我们为此类捐赠提供了具体的指导方针，并建议了实施捐赠计划的可能路径。
Most developed countries hold significant quantities of medical supplies in reserve for emergency response. Due to high handling costs and remote storage locations, such stocks are typically not used for day-to-day operations. In consequence, the expiry of reserve supplies (without use) is a significant problem. One possible remedy for such wastage is to donate large batches of dated supplies to developing nations, which often do without adequate medical supplies in their health systems. Here, we focus on personal protective equipment (PPE) and similar products, which have low risks associated with aging and safety. However, the international community is cautious about donating dated medical supplies, with the World Health Organization explicitly recommending against it. Issues of safety, while important, are not the primary concern as recent studies have shown expiration dates to be conservative. Instead, most concerns relate to macrolevel effects on the recipient country. Taking safety as given, we carefully model the incentives in the medical supplies donation supply chain, providing insights into the likely effects of corruption and impacts on the local industry. Overall, we find that the impact of donation is not monotone in the quality of donated products. In particular, dated donations whose quality is slightly lower than the quality of products in the local market are likely to be more beneficial than fresh donations; thus, we suggest that the international community reconsiders its stand on banning donations from dated reserves.We provide concrete guidelines for such donations and suggest a possible path for implementation of a donation program.
参考文献：Quan Zhou, Tava Lennon Olsen. Modeling the effects of dated medical supplies donation on recipient countries. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 116-130.
8.具有固定成本的随机库存模型的研究：(s, S)型最优性和(s, S)型策略-离散时间情况
订购物品或建立生产流程的固定成本在许多现实场景中都会出现。在它们的存在下，随机库存文献中最广泛使用的排序策略是$(s, S)$策略。$(s, S)$策略和$(s, S)$类型策略的最优性已用于各种库存模型，包括在每个时期或连续审查库存水平、有限和无限视域、折扣成本和平均成本标准、积压和损失销售实践、标准和广义需求和/或成本、确定性和随机交货期、单产品和多产品设置以及协调定价-库存决策。我们在两篇论文中全面考察了70多年来积累的大量文献。这篇论文致力于离散时间模型，和同伴论文，其也发表在这个期刊上，回顾的是连续时间模型。我们讨论了模型规范、证明技术、具体结果和文献中发表的文章的局限性。最后，我们对每篇论文提出了相应的延伸建议和未来研究的方向。
Fixed costs of ordering items or setting up a production process arise in many real-life scenarios. In their presence, the most widely used ordering policy in the stochastic inventory literature is the $(s,S)$ policy. Optimality of $(s,S)$ policies and $(s,S)$ -type policies have been examined for various inventory models, including those with the inventory level being reviewed in every period or continuously, finite and infinite horizons, discounted-cost and average-cost criteria, backlogging and lost-sales practices, standard and generalized demands and/or costs, deterministic and stochastic lead times, single-product and multi-product settings, and coordinated pricing-inventory decisions. We comprehensively survey the vast literature accumulated over seven decades in two papers. This paper is devoted to discrete-time models, and the companion paper, also published in this journal issue, reviews continuous-time models. We go over model specifications, proof techniques, specific results, and limitations of the articles published in the literature. We conclude each paper by providing corresponding suggestions for extensions and directions for future research.
参考文献：Sandun C. Perera, Suresh P. Sethi. A survey of stochastic inventory models with fixed costs: Optimality of (s, S) and (s, S)-type policies—Discrete-time case. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 131-153.
9.具有固定成本的随机库存模型研究：(s, S)型最优性和(s, S)型策略-连续时间情况
订购物品或建立生产流程的固定成本在许多现实场景中都会出现。在它们的存在下，随机库存文献中最广泛使用的排序策略是$(s, S)$策略。$(s, S)$策略和$(s, S)$类型策略的最优性已用于各种库存模型，包括在每个时期或连续审查库存水平、有限和无限视域、折扣成本和平均成本标准、积压和损失销售实践、标准和广义需求和/或成本、确定性和随机交货期、单产品和多产品设置以及协调定价-库存决策。我们在两篇论文中全面考察了70多年来积累的大量文献。这篇论文致力于连续时间模型，和同伴论文，其也发表在这个期刊上，回顾的是离散时间模型。我们讨论了模型规范、证明技术、具体结果和文献中发表的文章的局限性。最后，我们对每篇论文提出了相应的延伸建议和未来研究的方向。
Fixed costs of ordering items or setting up a production process arise in many real-life scenarios. In their presence, the most widely used ordering policy in the stochastic inventory literature is the $(s,S)$ policy. Optimality of $(s,S)$ policies and $(s,S)$ -type policies have been examined for various inventory models, including those with the inventory level being reviewed in every period or continuously, finite and infinite horizons, discounted-cost and average-cost criteria, backlogging and lost-sales practices, standard and generalized demands and/or costs, deterministic and stochastic lead times, single-product and multi-product settings, and coordinated pricing-inventory decisions. We comprehensively survey the vast literature accumulated over seven decades in two papers. This paper is devoted to continuous-time models, and the companion paper, also published in this journal issue, reviews discrete-time models. We go over model specifications, proof techniques, specific results, and limitations of the articles published in the literature. We conclude each paper by providing corresponding suggestions for extensions and directions for future research.
参考文献：Sandun C. Perera, Suresh P. Sethi. A survey of stochastic inventory models with fixed costs: Optimality of (s, S) and (s, S)-type policies—Continuous-time case. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 154-169.
10.面向未来和远方：心理距离和库存决策
对许多企业来说，在了解客户需求之前确定库存是一个至关重要的决定。尽管考虑到需求过剩和不足的成本，可以选择理想的订单数量，但先前的研究表明，决策者始终会做出次优库存选择。利用解释水平理论和心理距离，本文探讨了空间距离(地理上的供应商近或远)和时间距离(从订单到收到的提前时间短或长)的差异如何影响新闻供应商的决策。通过四个实验(N = 663)，我们发现心理距离较远会增加订单数量，这提高了高利润产品的性能，但会增加低利润产品的成本。考虑到空间和时间距离在供应链中自然存在，我们的研究表明，心理距离是有偏见的库存排序的认知解释，并可用于改善决策。
Determining inventory ahead of knowing customer demand is a crucial decision for many businesses. Although it is possible to select the ideal order quantity given the costs of over and undersupplying demand, prior research demonstrates that decision-makers consistently make suboptimal inventory choices. Drawing on construal level theory and psychological distance, this paper explores how differences in the spatial distance (suppliers that are geographically near or far) and temporal distance (short or long lead time from order to receipt) impact newsvendor decision-making. Across four experiments (N = 663), we find that a far psychological distance increases order quantities, which improves performance for high-margin products but results in added costs for low-margin goods. Given that spatial and temporal distances occur naturally in supply chains, our research shows that psychological distance is a cognitive explanation for biased inventory ordering and can be applied to improve decision-making.
参考文献：Samuel N. Kirshner, Brent B. Moritz. For the future and from afar: Psychological distance and inventory decision-making. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 170-188.
11.为共享储蓄计划下的医疗转诊提供护理协调
负责任的护理组织(ACOs)负责特定患者群体的护理质量和费用，包括转诊费用。在这种环境的激励下，我们研究了医疗转诊的护理协调。我们考虑一个ACO，将不确定数量的患者从其所属人群转介到专业卫生服务的首选外部提供者。ACOs通常根据医疗保险共享储蓄计划(MSSP)支付。在MSSP下，支付人为受益人群在一段固定时间内设定一个支出基准，并与ACO分享与此相关的任何收益(损失)。在计费期间，所有由ACO和外部供应商提供给相关人群的服务，将继续按服务收费进行发还。收益(损失)在期间结束时通过比较实际支出来确定，其中包括付款人在期间发生的所有护理费用(定期访问、转诊和失败的治疗)与预定义的基准。在这种环境下，ACO和外部提供者(后者在msp下没有得到补偿)缺乏在护理协调计划上投入足够资金的激励。我们研究了ACO与其首选的外部提供者之间的财务激励机制，以实现MSSP下转诊市场的综合护理协调。我们发现，传统的按服务收费和按人头收费协议不能为转诊市场的护理协调提供足够的激励。然而，风险和成本分担机制可以在满足ACO和提供者参与约束的同时，诱导综合护理协调工作。我们描述了一类这样的机制，并从数值上研究了ACO和外部供应商利润的可变性。我们证明，这种类型的协议不仅可以用于诱导综合护理协调，而且还可以导致利润可变性的帕累托改善。我们还说明了不同的MSSP风险跟踪参数对这种护理协调机制的性能的影响，包括它们对护理质量和支付人的平均支出的影响。
Accountable care organizations (ACOs) are responsible for the quality and cost of care of specified patient populations, including the cost of referrals. Motivated by this environment, we study care coordination for healthcare referrals. We consider an ACO that refers an uncertain number of patients from its attributed population to a preferred external provider for specialized health services. ACOs are typically paid under the Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP). Under the MSSP, the payer sets a spending benchmark for the beneficiary population during a fixed time period and shares any gains (losses) relative to it with the ACO. During the billing period, all services delivered to the attributed population by the ACO and external providers continue to be reimbursed under fee-for-service. Gains (losses) are determined at the end of the period by comparing the actual spending, which includes all care expenses (regular visits, referrals, and failed treatments) incurred by the payer in the period to the predefined benchmark. In this environment, the ACO and external providers—the latter not compensated under the MSSP—lack incentives to invest enough in care coordination initiatives. We study financial incentive mechanisms between the ACO and its preferred external provider to achieve integrated care coordination in referral markets under the MSSP. We show that traditional fee-for-service and capitation agreements do not provide sufficient incentives for care coordination in referral markets. However, a risk- and cost-sharing mechanism can induce integrated care coordination efforts while satisfying the ACO and provider's participation constraints. We characterize a family of such mechanisms and numerically study the variability of the ACO and the external provider's profit. We demonstrate that this type of agreement can be used not only to induce integrated care coordination but can also result in a Pareto improvement in profit variability. We also illustrate the impact of the different MSSP risk tracks parameters on the performance of this care coordination mechanism, including their effect on the quality of care and the payer's mean spending.
参考文献：Fernanda Bravo, Retsef Levi, Georgia Perakis, Gonzalo Romero. Care coordination for healthcare referrals under a shared-savings program. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 189-206.
12.分散供应链中的质量投资、检验政策和定价决策
本文研究了两级供应链中两个关键质量管理决策——输入符合性质量和检验政策——与相关批发和零售价格之间的相互作用。市场需求取决于零售价格以及最终产品的一致性质量，而最终产品的一致性质量本身又取决于输入质量和检验方案。与之前文献中的实证发现一致，我们发现，由于更好的质量具有降低成本的效果，质量的提高并不总是导致消费者的价格更高。我们还发现，较低的输入质量仍然可能导致较高的最终产品质量，因为它可能激励更多和/或更好的检查。由于渠道伙伴之间的激励不对称，在分散系统中，输入质量和检验政策之间的任何相互作用都变得更加明显。与集成系统相比，这使得采用全面检查策略更具有可能。事实上，虽然由于权力下放而导致的垂直竞争导致客户的价格更高，但它也可以导致最终产品的质量更好。在去中心化的背景下，另一个有趣的发现是，玩家可能确实会选择承担更高份额的罚款，因为销售给消费者的有缺陷的产品为玩家带来了更高的利润。
This paper studies the interaction between two key quality management decisions—input conformance quality and inspection policy—and related wholesale and retail prices in a two echelon supply chain. Market demand depends on the retail price as well as the end-product conformance quality, which itself depends on the input quality and the inspection scheme. Consistent with previous empirical findings in the literature, we show that an increase in quality does not always result in higher prices for consumers due to the cost-lowering effect of better quality. We also show that a lower input quality may still result in higher end-product quality because of how it might incentivize more and/or better inspection. Any interaction between input quality and inspection policy becomes more pronounced in the decentralized system due to incentive asymmetry between the channel partners. This makes the adoption of a full-inspection policy more likely there compared to an integrated system. Indeed, while vertical competition due to decentralization results in higher prices for customers, it can also result in better quality of end products. Another interesting finding in the decentralized setting is that, somewhat counterintuitively, a player may indeed opt to bear a higher share of the penalty for defective products sold to consumers resulting in higher profits for the player.
参考文献：Murat Erkoc, Haresh Gurnani, Saibal Ray, Mingzhu Jin. Quality investment, inspection policy, and pricing decisions in a decentralized supply chain. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 207-226.
13.让制造业处于攻势
在过去的几十年里，提升制造在公司战略中的作用的路径是相当明确的：提高基本的生产能力——通常是质量、可靠性、交货时间和生产过程的成本效率。丰田(Toyota)等日本领先企业为我们指明了道路。但随着许多人听从了建议并效仿，这种方法本质上已成为一种防御策略；你必须这样做才能不落后。制造业是否已经失去了创造企业战略所依赖的能力的潜力?我们的答案是绝对不会。事实上，与以往不同的是，制造业有多种创造竞争优势的途径，而这些途径需要开发新的、通常是非传统的能力。我们确定了五组新功能，由于很难在所有这些功能中都出类拔萃，因此我们提供了一个框架，用于根据公司的业务战略选择正确的组合。该框架侧重于两个近期趋势的影响：产品中嵌入的信息密度不断增加，制造过程的连通性不断增强。我们建议这五组能力的具体组合，可以支持和加速公司利用这些趋势的战略。我们用三家跨国公司的例子来说明这个过程。这些新机遇改变了制造业高管的传统角色。他们的关注点将需要极大地转移到与其他职能部门的同事合作和互动，以及管理公司界限之外的关系上。
The path for elevating the role of manufacturing in the company strategy in the last few decades has been rather clear: Improve the basic production capabilities—typically quality, reliability, lead times, and cost efficiency of production processes. Leading Japanese companies, like Toyota, showed the way. But as many have heeded the advice and followed suit, this approach has become essentially a defensive strategy; you must do it not to fall behind. Has manufacturing lost its potential to create capabilities on which a company's strategy can rest? Our answer is absolutely not. In fact, unlike before, manufacturing has multiple paths for creating a competitive advantage and these paths require development of new and often nontraditional capabilities. We identify five sets of new capabilities, and since it is hard to excel in all of them, we provide a framework for choosing the right mix depending on the company's business strategy. The framework focuses on the implications of two recent trends: increasing information density embedded in products and increasing connectedness of manufacturing processes. We suggest specific mixes of the five groups of capabilities that can support and accelerate a company's strategy to exploit these trends. We use examples from three multinationals to illustrate the process. These new opportunities change the traditional role of manufacturing executives. Their focus will need to shift exceedingly to collaborating and interfacing with colleagues in other functions as well as managing relationships beyond the boundaries of the company.
参考文献：Arnoud De Meyer, Kasra Ferdows, Ann Vereecke.Putting manufacturing on the offensive. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 227-236.
14.订单履行信息披露对欺骗性假冒产品后果的影响
在线零售商让消费者接触到越来越多由第三方市场卖家提供的欺骗性假冒产品。尽管领先的在线零售商通常试图通过提供库存所有权(即销售日期)和订单履行(即发货日期)等履行服务信息来提高对消费者的服务透明度，但人们对其影响仍然知之甚少，特别是在消费者收到欺骗性假冒产品的情况下。利用信号和归因理论，我们提出了一系列六个基于场景的实验，以探索在三种不同的零售环境中，履约服务选项与欺骗性假冒产品结合对消费者对产品质量、指责、信任侵蚀和回购意愿的影响。我们的研究结果强调了履行服务信息作为一个信号集的有效性，它可以为主要在线零售商设置一个先验的产品质量感知。此外，我们发现消费者在收到假冒产品时，会遵循因果图式的前提，将更多的责任归咎于负责销售产品的实体。我们的研究结果表明，虽然对小型零售商或初创公司的信任度显著下降，但这种下降在履行服务配置之间没有显著差异。此外，信任的侵蚀不会对回购意愿产生负面影响。然而，对于主要在线零售商和全渠道零售商来说，当库存所有权(即由谁销售)和订单履行(即由谁发货)与在线零售商相关时，信任侵蚀比与第三方卖家相关时更严重，并随后对回购意愿产生负面影响。
Online retailers have exposed their consumers to an increase of deceptive counterfeit products provided by third-party marketplace sellers. Although leading online retailers commonly seek to enhance service transparency to consumers by providing fulfillment service information, such as inventory ownership (i.e., sold by) and order fulfillment (i.e., shipped by), their impact remains poorly understood, particularly in the context of when consumers receive deceptive counterfeit products. Drawing on signaling and attribution theory, we develop a series of six scenario-based experiments to explore the impact of fulfillment service options in combination with deceptive counterfeits on consumer perception of product quality, blame, trust erosion, and repurchase intention across three different retailing contexts. Our results highlight the efficacy of fulfillment service information as a signal set in setting a priori product quality perceptions for the small and predominantly online retailer. Further, we find that consumers follow the premise of causal schemata to attribute more blame to the entity responsible for selling the product when they receive a counterfeit product. Our results show that while there is a significant decrease in trust for a small retailer or startup this decrease does not significantly differ between the fulfillment service configurations. Furthermore, the erosion in trust does not negatively impact repurchase intentions. However, for the predominantly online retailer and omni-channel retailer trust erosion is higher when inventory ownership (i.e., sold by) and order fulfillment (i.e., shipped by) are associated with the online retailer than with a third-party seller and subsequently negatively impacts repurchase intentions.
参考文献：Simone T. Peinkofer, Yao Henry Jin. The impact of order fulfillment information disclosure on consequences of deceptive counterfeits. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 237-260.
15.竞价价格控制用于汽车租赁网络收益管理
我们考虑了一个汽车租赁网络收益管理(RM)问题，考虑了汽车租赁服务的关键运营特征，如租赁长度的变化和库存的流动性，这意味着不同地点和不同日期的库存租赁需求的跨时间和空间相关性。为了考虑汽车租赁业务的时变和周期性，将问题表述为无限视界循环随机动态规划。为了解决维数问题，我们提出了一种基于乘积和时间依赖的拉格朗日乘子的拉格朗日松弛(LR)方法，将动态网络问题分解为多个单站单天子问题。我们证明拉格朗日对偶问题是一个凸规划，然后提出了一个基于次梯度的算法来解决对偶问题，并得到了一个基于LR的投标价格策略。为了提高LR方法的可伸缩性，我们进一步提出了三种更简单的基于LR的投标价格策略变量，其中包括位置依赖或交货期依赖的拉格朗日乘数，或两者兼有之。我们的数值研究表明，基于LR的投标价格策略可以优于一些常用的启发式策略。使用一组真实的预订数据，我们提供了一个案例研究，在该案例研究中，我们实证地展示了汽车租赁服务的运营特征，使用泊松回归模型校准预订请求的到达过程，并证明基于LR的投标价格策略确实在样本内和样本外的范围内都优于其他启发式方法。
We consider a car rental network revenue management (RM) problem, accounting for the key operational characteristics of car rental services such as the varying length of rentals and mobility of inventories, which imply the intertemporal and spatial correlations of rental demands for inventories across different locations and days. The problem is formulated as an infinite-horizon cyclic stochastic dynamic program to account for the time-varying and cyclic nature of car rental businesses. To tackle the curse of dimensionality, we propose a Lagrangian relaxation (LR) approach with product- and time-dependent Lagrangian multipliers to decomposing the dynamic network problem into multiple single-station single-day subproblems. We show that the Lagrangian dual problem is a convex program and then develop a subgradient-based algorithm to solve the dual problem and derive an LR-based bid price policy. To improve the scalability of the LR approach, we further propose three simpler LR-based bid price policy variants with either location-dependent or leadtime-dependent Lagrangian multipliers, or both. Our numerical study indicates that the LR-based bid price policies can outperform some commonly used heuristics. Using a set of real-world booking data, we provide a case study in which we empirically demonstrate the operational characteristics of car rental services, calibrate the arrival process of booking requests using a Poisson regression model, and demonstrate that the LR-based bid price policies indeed outperform other heuristics consistently in both in-sample and out-of-sample horizons.
参考文献：Dong Li, Zhan Pang, Lixian Qian.Bid price controls for car rental network revenue management.. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 261-282.
16.减轻排放上限合规背后的财务风险：海上运输的一个案例
越来越严格的排放限制监管要求的执行正在挑战着各个运输部门的传统运营。在海运方面，最近实施了将燃料含硫量限制在0.50%的“IMO 2020”规定。海运公司采取了一系列行动，以使他们的船只符合这一规定。虽然技术条件已经明确，但由于当前转型时期存在不可避免的不确定性，特别是燃料价格的长期影响，投资决策很难做出。在本研究中，我们考虑了远洋承运人的技术投资决策。每个合规解决方案都受到不确定的运营成本的影响，其部分特征的概率分布可能偏离当前的预期规范。运营商为其整个机队选择合规性解决方案组合，该组合将最好地遵守两个决策标准，即投资的净现值目标和机队部署的产能利用率目标。为了找到在不确定的过渡时期表现良好的最优决策，我们引入了一个易于处理的数学模型，称为模糊鲁棒性优化模型，以最小化与预期NPV未达到指定目标的风险相关的财务风险指数。我们进一步通过混合整数二阶锥规划近似提出了一种求解方案，该方案可以通过现有求解器有效求解。我们用亚洲-北美西海岸航运网络的真实数据进行了数值实验，结果表明该决策支持系统表现良好。
The enforcement of ever-stringent regulatory requirements capping emission limits is challenging the traditional operations of various transportation sectors. In maritime transportation, the recent regulation tightening fuel sulfur limits to 0.50%, known as the “IMO 2020,” has been enforced.There is a flurry of activities by ocean carriers to equip their vessels to comply with this regulation.Although the technical conditions are clear, investment decisions are hard to make due to inevitable uncertainties in the current transition period, especially on the impact of fuel prices in the long run.In this study, we consider an ocean carrier's technology investment decisions. Each compliance solution is subject to uncertain operating costs with a partially characterized probability distribution that may deviate from current expected norms. The carrier chooses a portfolio of compliance solutions for its entire fleet that would best adhere to two decision criteria characterized by a net present value (NPV) target in investment and a capacity utilization rate target in fleet deployment.To find optimal decisions that will perform well in the uncertain transition period, we introduce a tractable mathematical model, termed the ambiguous robustness optimization model, to minimize the financial riskiness index associated with the risk of expected NPV not meeting a specified target.We further propose a solution scheme through mixed-integer second-order cone programming approximation that can be efficiently solved by off-the-shelf solvers. We show that this decision support system performs well in numerical experiments constructed using real data on the Asia-North America West Coast shipping network.
参考文献：Qinghe Sun, Li Chen, Mabel C. Chou, Qiang Meng. Mitigating the financial risk behind emission cap compliance: A case in maritime transportation. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 283-300.
17.门诊专科实践的部分分区模板策略
模板策略指定了关于容量分配和预约的政策，这是门诊专业实践(SPs)中患者访问管理的核心。在广泛实施的分区模板策略中，预约能力专门分配给由患者属性和医疗条件组合定义的每个患者组，这通常会导致对服务提供商的使用挑战。受到大型学术医疗中心SP所面临的问题的激励，我们提出了部分分区的模板策略，将患者组聚集到访问类中，并为这些类分配预约时段。我们建立了一个两阶段随机优化模型，在模板策略设计中同时优化患者群体聚类和容量分配的决策。我们基于Benders割和预期逼近提出了一个有效解决问题的算法。使用真实数据的数值实验表明，部分分区策略通过保持高容量利用率的平衡并为优先患者提供及时的访问，优于SPs使用的基准策略。此外，我们还研究了广泛的SP设置，以获得基于实践细节的模板策略的可转移见解。
Templating strategies specify policies on capacity allocation and appointment booking, which are central to patient access management in outpatient specialty practices (SPs). In the widely implemented partitioned templating strategy, appointment capacity is allocated exclusively to each patient group defined by a combination of patient attributes and medical conditions, which often results in utilization challenges for SPs. Motivated by problems faced by an SP within a large academic medical center, we propose partially partitioned templating strategies that cluster patient groups into access classes and allocate appointment slots to these classes. We formulate a two-stage stochastic optimization model to simultaneously optimize decisions on patient group clustering and capacity allocation in the templating strategy design. We develop an efficient solution algorithm for the problem, which otherwise poses a combinatorial challenge, based on Benders' cuts and an anticipatory approximation. Numerical experiments using real-world data show that the partially partitioned strategies outperform benchmark strategies used by SPs through maintaining a balance of high capacity utilization and providing timely access for priority patients. In addition, we study a wide range of SP setups for transferable insights on templating strategies based on practice specifics.
参考文献：Miao Bai, Bjorn Berg, Esra Sisikoglu Sir, Mustafa Y. Sir. Partially partitioned templating strategies for outpatient specialty practices. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 301-318.
18.供应链中与战略客户的合作竞争策略
我们研究了专利部件制造商(MPC)和原始设备制造商(OEM)之间的合作竞争策略。MPC可以选择向OEM提供组件，也可以在终端市场上与自己的最终产品竞争。顾客可以从这两家公司购买，他们选择现在购买还是以后购买。在一个两期博弈理论模型中，我们分析了MPC的最优合作竞争策略，主要考虑是向OEM销售产品还是进入终端市场。最优策略可以用客户的耐心等待和竞争对手的产品质量来表征。然后，我们扩展了我们的模型来调查三个关键因素：新客户姗姗来迟，两家公司之间的成本差异，以及第三方供应商的存在。虽然在前两种扩展中，最优策略在性质上与主模型相同，但第三方供应商的存在对MPC的合作竞争策略的选择产生了至关重要的影响。我们讨论了货币政策委员会应该如何平衡合作与竞争，并描述了货币政策委员会应该改变战略的条件。
We study the co-opetition strategy between a manufacturer of a proprietary component (MPC) and an original equipment manufacturer (OEM). The MPC can choose to supply components to the OEM and can also compete in the end market with its own final product. Customers can purchase from either firm and are strategic in that they choose whether to buy now or later. In a two-period game theoretical model, we analyze the MPC's optimal co-opetition strategy, which mainly concerns whether to sell to the OEM or to enter the end market. The optimal strategy can be characterized by the customer's patience to wait and the competitor's product quality. We then extend our model to investigate three key factors: new customers arriving late, cost differentiation between the two firms, and the existence of a third-party supplier. While in the first two extensions the optimal strategies remain qualitatively the same as in the main model, the existence of a third-party supplier impacts the MPC's choice of co-opetition strategy crucially. We discuss how the MPC should balance cooperation and competition, and characterize the conditions when the MPC should change strategy.
参考文献：Weizhe Yang, Yaozhong Wu, Qinglong Gou, Wen Zhang. Co-opetition strategies in supply chains with strategic customers. Production and Operations Management, 2023, 32(1), 319-334.
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