Exploratory Research on Engineering the Transport Industries (ETI): Transportation, Logistics and the Internet - New Challenges and Opportunities

该奖项由交通运输行业(ETI)项目工程探索性研究项目征集颁发，旨在确定互联网和信息技术日益普及所带来的运输和物流领域的重要力量、趋势和机遇。其中一个机会将被详细研究，即使用灵活的定价和投标策略来提高运输和物流效率。挑战在于，大多数实用的竞价系统具有各种各样的复杂性，如不确定的需求、顺序竞价系统和条件竞价，而现有的模型和算法无法有效地处理这些问题。这笔赠款的结果将包括：(1)对运输和物流业新出现的做法进行调查，除其他外，编目运输服务买卖双方可获得的信息的类型(和及时性)、供应商、生产者和承运商之间的一体化程度以及价值链各要素之间的协调程度；(2)对运输和物流业新出现的重要机遇和相关研究问题进行总结，作为这一领域未来研究工作的潜在路线图；以及(3)案例研究(包括开发新的优化模型和解决方案方法)，展示了该行业的一个重要趋势，并描述了潜在的反应和影响。随着新理论的发展和应用，可以利用运输中发生的重大变化来显著提高运输和物流效率，这对承运人和托运人来说都是如此。

This award, made under the Exploratory Research on Engineering the Transport Industries (ETI) program solicitation, provides funding to identify important forces, trends and opportunities in transportation and logistics resulting from the increasing presence of the Internet and information technologies. One opportunity, using flexible pricing and bidding strategies to improve transportation and logistics efficiencies, will be studied in detail. The challenge is that most practical bidding systems possess a variety of complications, like uncertain demands, sequential bidding systems and conditional bids, which current models and algorithms are unable to handle efficiently. The results of this grant will include: (1) a survey of emerging practices in the transportation and logistics industry, cataloging among other things, the types (and timeliness) of information available to buyers and sellers of transportation services, the levels of integration among suppliers, producers and carriers, and the degrees of coordination between elements of the value chain; (2) a summary of the important emerging opportunities and the associated research problems in the transportation and logistics industry, serving as a potential roadmap for future research efforts in this domain; and (3) a case study (involving the development of a new optimization model and a solution approach) showcasing an important trend in the industry and characterizing the potential responses and implications. With the development and application of new theory, the major changes occurring in transportation can be exploited to improve transportation and logistics efficiencies significantly, for carriers and shippers.