Collaborative Research: Optimization Approach to Collaborative Games in Supply Chain Management

供应链合作中最重要的问题之一是参与企业如何分担成本和利益。这样的问题可以很自然地用合作博弈论的概念来分析。本项目主要研究几种基本的供应链合作博弈。将研究这些合作博弈的各种相关关键问题，例如，核心的存在，计算的核心分配，核心分配的敏感性，成本参数等。这些合作游戏往往是多阶段的性质，并涉及需求/供应的不确定性和复杂的成本结构。供应链游戏的这些独特特征带来了重大挑战。这些游戏的研究需要各种新的和有趣的优化模型。作为回应，需要开发先进的优化技术和算法来分析这些合作游戏。如果成功，这个项目将推进我们在优化，合作博弈和供应链管理方面的知识。本计画所发展之最佳化技术与演算法，不仅可应用于供应链合作博弈之分析，也可加深我们对经典供应链最佳化模型之了解。此外，该项目将为企业提供指导方针，以解决供应链合作中的成本/收益分配问题，并最终帮助他们提高供应链的效率。

One of the most important issues in supply chain collaboration is how the participating firms share the cost and benefit. Such an issue can be naturally analyzed using concepts from the cooperative game theory. This project focuses on several fundamental cooperative supply chain games. A variety of relevant key issues for these cooperative games will be investigated, e.g., the existence of the core, computation of core allocations, sensitivity of core allocations to cost parameters, etc. These cooperative games are often multi-stage in nature, and involve demand/supply uncertainties and complex cost structures. These distinct features of supply chain games impose significant challenges. Studies on these games necessitate a variety of new and interesting optimization models. In response, advanced optimization techniques and algorithms need to be developed to analyze these cooperative games. If successful, this project will advance our knowledge in optimization, cooperative games, and supply chain management. The optimization techniques and algorithms developed from this project will be useful not only in analyzing cooperative supply chain games, but also in deepening our understanding of classical supply chain optimization models. Furthermore, this project will provide firms with guidelines to address the cost/benefit allocation issues in supply chain collaboration and ultimately help them improve the efficiency of their supply chains.