Design and performance analysis of dynamic supply chain contracts

近年来，由于制造技术进步带来的产品种类增加，信息和运输技术进步带来的外包，以及知识渊博的客户，商业实践发生了巨大变化。竞争的焦点现在已经从整合供应链的层面转移到分散和独立的公司相互合作的层面。与此趋势相对应，我们将产品的商业特征定义为价格弹性、供给不确定性和需求不确定性，将市场的商业特征定义为一个商业组织与其他商业组织的互动，即去中心化，以及与其他竞争者的竞争。在相关的规划范围内，其中一些业务特征正在发生变化。另一方面，大多数供应链契约都是在业务特征不变的假设下实施的。如果某些业务特征正在发生变化，那么相关的规划范围将被分割成许多“独立”的阶段。所选择的供应链合同应用于各个阶段，合同参数需要根据该阶段的商业环境进行调整。这种方法的缺点是：(1)“过度简化”了不同阶段之间的相互作用；(2)在合同选择中忽略了历史数据的价值。据我所知，还没有人明确尝试在不断变化的环境中同时处理所有业务特征。这项研究计划正是为了实现这一目标。首先，我计划在不断变化的环境下，通过考虑产品和市场业务特征来研究任何给定的共同供应链合同的绩效。然后，在绩效分析的基础上，提供管理见解，将企业特征与供应链合同所需的特征匹配起来，指导供应链合同的设计。大多数行业（尤其是零售业）都期待在这一领域取得重大进展。

The business practices have changed dramatically in recent years, due to increased product variety resulting from manufacturing technology advancements, outsourcing as a result of information and transportation technology advancements, and more knowledgeable customers. The focus of competition has now shifted from the level of integrated supply chains to that of decentralized and independent firms collaborating with each other. Corresponding to this trend, we define the business characteristics of a product as price elasticity, supply uncertainty and demand uncertainty and the business characteristics of a market as the interaction of one business organization with other business organizations, i.e., decentralization, and its competition with other competitors. Some of these business characteristics are changing over the concerned planning horizon. On the other hand, most supply chain contracts are implemented under the assumption of constant business characteristics. If some business characteristics are changing, then the concerned planning horizon will be segmented into a number of "independent" stages. The selected supply chain contract is applied in each stage and the contract parameters need to be adjusted according to the business environment at that stage. The drawbacks of this approach are (1) "oversimplified" interaction between different stages and (2) ignoring the value of historical data in contract selection. To the best of my knowledge, no explicit attempt to address all business characteristics simultaneously in a changing environment has yet been undertaken. This research program is precisely to accomplish this. First, I plan to investigate the performance of any given common supply chain contract by taking both product and market business characteristics into consideration under a changing environment. Then, based on the performance anayisis, managerial insights will be provided to match business characteristics with features required in supply chain contracts to guide the design of supply chain contracts. Most industries (particularly retail industry) are looking forward to seeing significant progress in this area.