试论大区公司集中库存管理——对中国石油成品油供应链管理模式的探索

当前中国石油的成品油配送体系仍然停留在要货制上。炼化企业、大区公司和省区公司由于各自的库存控制策略不同,存在“牛鞭效应”,容易导致需求放大、库存偏高。组织流、信息流、物流不畅是导致供应链库存不当的主要原因,实行大区公司集中库存管理可以有效地解决这个问题。这种管理模式体现了供应链集成化管理的思想,突破了传统的“库存拥有者管理库存”的禁锢,由大区公司作为上下游企业的沟通和联系桥梁,并对成品油的生产、流通和库存进行管理和控制。大区公司集中库存管理是一种以信息化为基础的过程管理,它可以使各企业集中优势资源做好自己擅长的业务,通过信息共享提高决策效果,实现成品油的自动配送补货以及整个系统运营的优化。为此,须建立统一的编码系统、市场销售信息库、物流调度指挥系统、库存信息共享机制、成品油配送成本管理系统以及供应链协调管理机制等。     

基于连锁零售企业退货管理的供应链协调机制研究

在对连锁零售企业退货物流网络结构进行分析的基础上,建立了与价格相关的随机需求下存在顾客退货和允许库存结转的单一供应商、单一连锁零售企业、单一产品的供应链模型。根据供应链一体化模式下得到的相关决策变量的一阶条件,论证基于回馈和惩罚的批发价格契约能够实现供应链的协调。研究表明,在给定回馈和惩罚因子的前提下,供应商可以通过调整目标订购数量来实现供应链整体利润的任意分配,并且当目标订购数量和回馈惩罚因子满足一定条件时,供应链的协调才是有效的,从而为连锁零售企业的退货物流管理提供了重要的理论依据。     

The Impact of the Corporate Mind‐set on New Product Launch Strategy and Market Performance

In the last decade, there has been an increasing interest in the link between new product launch strategy and market performance. So far, new product launch research has focused on this performance relationship without giving much attention to background factors that can facilitate or inhibit successful launch strategies. However, investigating such antecedents that set the framework in which different strategic launch decisions enable or prevent the market performance of new products is useful for enhancing the current state of knowledge. Drawing on the concept of a firm's orientation, the present study discusses the influence of the corporate mind‐set on new product launch strategy and market performance. It is hypothesized that the capability to successfully launch new products is based on the interplay between a firm's mind‐set (i.e., an analytical, risk‐taking, and aggressive posture) and its strategic launch decisions on setting launch objectives, selecting target markets, and positioning the new product. A research model with mediating effects is proposed, where the corporate mind‐set determines the launch strategy decisions, which in turn impact market performance. The model is tested with data on 113 industrial new products launched in business‐to‐business markets in Germany using a multiple informant approach. The results support the mediated model as the dimensions of the corporate mind‐set have a significant impact on most strategic launch decisions, which in turn significantly contribute to market performance. It is found that while an analytical posture relates to all three strategic launch decisions, risk taking and an aggressive posture have a significant impact on two, respectively one, launch strategy elements. These findings confirm the importance of investigating antecedents for a successful new product launch, as the corporate mind‐set serves as a background resource that sets the framework for successful new product launch decisions. In the final section implications for research and managerial practice as well as limitations of this research are provided.     

Launching new product features: a multiple case examination

The present study investigates the strategies that eight companies employed in launching new product features in a variety of markets. A literature review shows that launching new product features is an under‐researched area. This lack of attention may be detrimental to companies, as in many mature markets—such as those for durable consumer goods like television sets, coffee machines or videocassette recorders—the launch of new product features is perhaps the single most important product development activity that companies employ. We sought to address three research questions, namely what are the current strategies used by managers for launching new product features, how do these strategies differ, and what are the opportunities and pitfalls of these strategies? A multiple case study involving 38 managers from different functional backgrounds was used, thereby investigating the feature introductions of eight companies in‐depth. The study first identifies six feature launch decisions: the feature's position in the feature life cycle, the core technology concerned, the focus on feature or product, the differentiation practices used by the firm, feature diffusion in the product line, and the make‐or‐buy decision. Based on these decisions, four distinct feature launch strategies were distinguished: dictatorship, pioneering, establishing, and following. Dictatorship companies launch feature innovations that are based on fundamentally new technologies. Pioneers are not as powerful as dictators and focus on features that are based on applied and proven rather than on fundamentally new technologies. Establishes copy and improve successful features and launch them quickly and broadly as a standard in mass markets. Followers launch standard features that already existed in the mass market. These four strategies describe how the firms in our sample launched new features in the marketplace. As such, they describe when and where in the product line what feature was introduced. Such a typology of feature launch strategies helps to proactively understand the strategies firms have for launching new product features. The article discusses for each strategy the relevant feature launch decisions, possible applications, and opportunities and pitfalls. We conclude with the implications of our study for research and managerial practice.     

Efficient location of industrial activity cells in a global supply chain

Inefficient locations for production, distribution and reverse logistics plants will result in excess costs no matter how well material requirements planning (MRP), inventory control, distribution and information sharing decisions are optimized. In this paper we study ways in which aspect of activity cell location decisions can be analyzed within an extended MRP model. This model has previously been extended by including distribution and reverse logistics components in a compact form, presented in Grubbström et al. (2007). Our aim is to demonstrate the basic differences between an approach to location problems with MRP “under the same roof” as the global supply chain, in which transportation time delays and direct transportation costs have substantial influence. We discuss possibilities of how to present location aspects in the supply chain model obtained from combining input–output analysis and Laplace transforms in four sub-systems, namely manufacturing, distribution, consumption and reverse logistics, and show how the transportation costs and lead time influenced by the location of all these activities affect the resulting net present value (NPV). Our aim is to build a model supporting decisions concerning the structure of a supply chain as an alternative to a mixed integer programming formulation. The model developed is based on the use of continuous functions describing spatial distributions of cost and customer demand. Continuous functions are embedded in the MRP extension previously introduced in Grubbström et al. (2007).Location decisions influence (i) production costs, because timing influences the cost of activities involved in creating a product, cf. (Grubbström and Bogataj, submitted for publication), and (ii) logistics costs, which refer to the procurement and physical transmission of materials through the supply chain. In this current paper we wish to combine both of these aspects into a comprehensive model, where we show the interaction between the “space of flows” and the “space of places” as Giovanni Arrighi distinguishes one from the other in his book The Long Twentieth Century.     

An integrated production–distribution model for the dynamic location and allocation problem with safety stock optimization

The design and management of a multi-stage production–distribution system is one of the most critical problems in logistics and in facility management. Companies need to be able to evaluate and design different configurations for their logistic networks as quickly as possible. This means coordinating the entire supply chain effectively in order to minimize costs and simultaneously optimize facilities location, the allocation of customer demand to production/distribution centers, the inbound and outbound transportation activities, the product flows between production and/or warehousing facilities, the reverse logistics activities, etc.Full optimization of supply chain is achieved by integrating strategic, tactical, and operational decision-making in terms of the design, management, and control of activities. The cost-based and mixed-integer programming model presented in this study has been developed to support management in making the following decisions: the number of facilities (e.g. warehousing systems, distribution centers), the choice of their locations and the assignment of customer demand to them, and also incorporate tactical decisions regarding inventory control, production rates, and service-level determination in a stochastic environment. This paper presents an original model for the dynamic location–allocation problem with control of customer service level and safety stock optimization. An experimental analysis identifies the most critical factors affecting the logistics cost, and to finish, an industrial application is illustrated demonstrating the effectiveness of the proposed optimization approach.     

How should you stabilise your supply chains?

This case based research paper examines the stabilisation strategies used within seven supply chains and presents a framework to help practitioners stabilise their chains. The findings show that organisations should first select a cushioning strategy and then reduce demand uncertainty to lower the level of cushion held. However, they need to recognise that other organisations within the supply chain are making similar decisions and the whole supply chain needs to be stabilised. Despite this, businesses seem to only share information about their demand uncertainty-reducing mechanisms and not their cushioning strategies. This means that companies often make decisions in isolation of each other, which can then destabilise the chain.     

Capacity decisions and supply price games under flexibility of backward integration

A key issue in supply chain design for manufacturing firms is how to make a trade-off between strategies of vertical integration and outsourcing. A two-echelon supply chain model with one supplier and one manufacturer is set up to study this issue. The manufacturer makes decisions on two types of capacities, one is core capacity that cannot be outsourced, the other is non-core capacity on which the manufacturer implements a strategy that includes three options—complete, partial or no outsourcing. Such a strategy is referred to as “flexibility of backward integration”. Optimal capacity decisions of the manufacturer are given and the supplier's pricing strategies are discussed. Managerial implications of partial outsourcing are investigated. The impact of the flexibility of backward integration is presented and finally, supply chain coordination is analyzed.     

Launch Strategy and New Product Performance: An Empirical Examination in The Netherlands

Although previous research has investigated the concept and contents of new product performance, there is still no consensus about the managerial decisions that constitute a launch strategy and how such decisions impact new product performance. The research objective for the present investigation is to assess the impact of launch strategy and market characteristics on new product performance and to test the stability of this impact across consumer and industrial products. Data were collected on 272 consumer and industrial new products in The Netherlands through a mail questionnaire approach. We based our definition of a launch strategy on an extensive literature review and interviews with managers. Our conceptualization of new product performance represented two dimensions, namely, market acceptance and product performance. The market acceptance dimension reflects the new product's market position and sales levels. The product performance dimension refers to the quality and technical performance level of the new product. This richer specification of the dependent variable provides a better view on which launch decisions impact which dimensions of new product performance. The impact of launch strategy was higher for market acceptance than for product performance, overall and for both consumer and industrial subsamples separately. In line with results from recent studies, overall, market acceptance is influenced by the product's innovativeness, timing of market entry, breadth of assortment, branding, pricing, the objective of increasing market penetration, and competitor reactions. Product performance is influenced by the product's innovativeness, breadth of assortment, and by the objective of using an existing market. Analyzing the consumer and industrial products separately showed that the general picture of launch decisions and their impact on the dependent variables was comparable across the total sample and both subsamples, indicating that heterogeneous samples in new product launch research may not cause major interpretation problems. Second, the analyses revealed that some launch decisions are more important in attaining new product success for consumer products than for industrial products, and vice versa. While these decisions do not lead to contradicting results in the samples, they show that some decisions may be especially relevant for only consumer or industrial products. We discuss research and managerial implications of the results.     

The impact of lean practices on inventory turnover

Lean manufacturing (LM) is currently enjoying its second heyday. Companies in several industries are implementing lean practices to keep pace with the competition and achieve better results. In this article, we will concentrate on how companies can improve their inventory turnover performance through the use of lean practices. According to our main proposition, firms that widely apply lean practices have higher inventory turnover than those that do not rely on LM. However, there may be significant differences in inventory turnover even among lean manufacturers depending on their contingencies. Therefore, we also investigate how various contingency factors (production systems, order types, product types) influence the inventory turnover of lean manufacturers. We use cluster and correlation analysis to separate manufacturers based on the extent of their leanness and to examine the effect of contingencies. We acquired the data from the International Manufacturing Strategy Survey (IMSS) in ISIC sectors 28-35.     

Launch Strategy, Launch Tactics, and Demand Outcomes

In a typical new product development process, the role of the launch stage is to maximize the chances of profitably achieving acceptance in the target market. A launch plan can include strategic decisions (such as relative innovativeness, mass versus niche targeting, and lead versus follow) as well as tactical decisions (including the types of communication and distribution activities to emphasize, introductory pricing, branding, and when to announce new items and delete old ones). Unfortunately, the existing literature offers limited decision-making guidance to managers on how to prioritize and integrate the various strategic and tactical options. This article presents a conceptual framework that suggests that the strategic and tactical challenges posed in various product launch situations depend in large measure on the specific type of buying behavior to be influenced. Depending on the degree of product innovativeness, managers may establish one of three types of desired demand outcomes: (1) trial and repurchase, (2) customer migration, or (3) innovation adoption and diffusion. The degree to which the desired demand outcome is realized is shown to be dependent on buyers' perceptions of the new product's relative advantage and of its compatibility with buyers' values and experiences. Perceptions of the product on these two characteristics are initially influenced by the launch strategy. Given an understanding of these perceptions, managers can then select launch tactics designed to clarify or leverage relative advantages or to demonstrate or enhance compatibility to the target market. The framework also demonstrates how the linkages among launch strategy, launch tactics, and the demand outcomes are impacted by the product-market environment, the technological dynamics of the industry, and the firm's resources and capabilities. The author argues that, by examining a given launch situation in the context of this framework, managers will be able to think more systematically about the strategy and tactics required for market acceptance.     

库存控制之供应链多目标视角下的应用研究——以工业润滑油供应链为例

供应链环境下库存控制的研究已经成为趋势,区别于常规的单目标库存控制的研究,本文以工业润滑油供应链为依托,提出了在供应链背景下考虑供应链库存成本最小化和客户平均需求满足率最大化为目标的库存控制研究思路,构建了多目标库存控制模型。最后将所建的供应链视角下多目标库存控制决策模型进行实证分析,为目标供应链上的企业做出生产、销售等决策提供依据。     

低碳供应链环境下作业成本法在第三方物流企业中的应用

随着第三方物流企业日益重视供应链竞争,传统的成本核算方法不能准确客观的对供应链环境下的物流成本进行计算,更无法合理分配碳成本。本文运用作业成本法,基于整个供应链以真实成本核算为导向选取碳排放成本指标,将其作为独立模块纳入成本核算系统中,便于企业掌握准确真实的成本信息,进行成本控制,做出成本决策。     

Industrial New Product Launch Strategies and Product Development Performance

Just as reporters must answer a few fundamental questions in every story they write, decision-makers in the new product development (NPD) process must address five key issues: what to launch, where to launch, when to launch, why to launch, and how to launch. These decisions involve significant commitments of time, money, and resources. They also go a long way toward determining the success or failure of any new product. Deeper insight into the tradeoffs these decisions involve may help to increase the likelihood of success for product launch efforts. Erik Jan Hultink, Abbie Griffin, Susan Hart, and Henry Robben present the results of a study that examines the interplay between these product launch decisions and NPD performance. Noting that previous launch studies focus primarily on the tactical decisions (that is, how to launch) rather than on the strategic decisions (what, where, when, and why to launch), they explore not only which decisions are important to success, but also the associations between the two sets of decisions. Because the strategic launch decisions made early in the NPD process affect the tactical decisions made later in the process, their study emphasizes the importance of launch consistency—that is, the alignment of the strategic and tactical decisions made throughout the process. The survey respondents—managers from marketing, product development, or general management in U.K. firms—provided information about 221 industrial new products launched during the previous five years. The responses identify associations between various sets of strategic and tactical decisions. That is, the responses suggest that the strategic decisions managers make regarding product innovativeness, market targeting, the number of competitors, and whether the product is marketing- or technology-driven are associated with subsequent tactical decisions regarding branding, distribution expenditure and intensity, and pricing. The study also suggests that different sets of launch decisions have differing effects on performance of industrial new products. In this study, the greatest success was enjoyed by a small group of respondents categorized as Niche Innovators. Their launch strategy involves a niche focus, targeting innovative products into markets with few competitors. Tactical decisions made by this group include exclusive distribution, a skimming pricing strategy, and a broad product assortment.     

模糊随机环境下考虑碳限额和碳交易机制的库存配送问题研究

本文以高端物流服务集成商与库存配送服务商为研究对象，以集成商的供应链网络成本最小、服务商的运营成本最小且准时制供应为目标，深入研究考虑碳限额、碳交易机制以及残次品处理的多供应商选择多产品多阶段库存配送问题，构建了基于动态规划的双层库存配送模型。利用双层全局--局部--邻域粒子群算法 (Bi-GLNPSO) 设计了模型求解方案，并通过算例验证了模型和算法的有效性和合理性。探讨了碳限额和碳交易机制对总成本和库存配送决策的影响。     

Introduction to design and analysis of production systems

In a two-party VMI channel, the vendor operates the basic stocking and delivery functions and makes inventory replenishment decisions while the retailer is responsible for customer acquisition and in-store services. This paper focuses on such retail channel and proposes an analytical model for the partners in supply channel to determine the inventory policy with the objective of optimizing system net profit. The model explicitly incorporates issues from both the vendor and the retailer in order to derive a policy for mutual benefits. To illustrate and obtain insights from the proposed solution procedure, we devise a set of numerical analyses based on various scenarios. Factors such as shelf-space-dependent demand, shelf-space capacity, demand pattern, logistics characteristics, and disparity between holding costs of the warehouse and the retail store are also investigated.     

Ordering and pricing policies in a manufacturing and distribution supply chain for fashion products

In the paper, we develop a model of manufacturing and distribution supply chains that are operating to meet price-sensitive random demand for products with short life cycles such as fashion products. Two specific scenarios are considered. The manufacturer-controlled scenario is one where the distributor shares price-sensitive random demand with the manufacturer, and the manufacturer controls the supply chain stocking decisions and bears the risk of overstocking costs. The distributor-controlled scenario works in the opposite direction. Prevailing wisdom suggests that the manufacturer should control supply chain decisions (e.g., via vendor-managed inventory). Our results indicate that such an arrangement is against the interest of a distributor selling short life-cycle products. Furthermore, we find that the total supply chain profit is generally higher when the distributor controls the supply chain stocking decisions and bears the risk of overstocking costs.     

Identifying the Key Success Factors in New Product Launch

Effective product launch is a key driver of top performance, and launch is often the single costliest step in new product development. Despite its importance, costs, and risks, product launch has been relatively underresearched in the product literature. We reviewed the extant literature on product launch to identify the most critical strategic, tactical, and information-gathering activities influencing the launch success. We then used a retrospective methodology to gather managerial perceptions regarding launch activities pertaining to a recent new product launch, and the product's performance in terms of profitability, market share, and relative sales. A mail survey of PDMA practitioners elicited data on nearly 200 recent product launches. Successful launches were found to be related to perceived superior skills in marketing research, sales force, distribution, promotion, R&D, and engineering. Having cross-functional teams making key marketing and manufacturing decisions, and getting logistics involved early in planning, were strategic activities that were strongly related to successful launches. Several tactical activities were related to successful launches: high quality of selling effort, advertising, and technical support; good launch management and good management of support programs; and excellent launch timing relative to customers and competitors. Furthermore, information-gathering activities of all kinds (market testing, customer feedback, advertising testing, etc.) were very important to successful launches. We conclude with observations about current product launch practice and with recommendations to management. Logistics plays a key role in successful strategy development and should receive the requisite amount of managerial attention. In particular, activities involving logistics personnel in strategy development showed much room for improvement. We also find that the timing of the launch (i.e., when the launch is conducted from the point of view of the company, the competition, and the customer) is just as important as whether the activities are performed. More managerial attention should be devoted to launch timing with respect to all of these viewpoints in order to improve the chances of success.     

Streamlining inventory flows with time discounts to improve the profits of a decentralized supply chain

We consider a decentralized supply chain, whereby a supplier sells a product to a group of independent buyers, and develop a strategy for the supplier to offer an all-units price discount or cash rebate for orders that are synchronized with its replenishments. As synchronized orders can be met with inventory directly from receiving to shipping without warehousing, the proposed strategy streamlines system inventory flows to minimize inventory and, hence, the related costs. On the other hand, by increasing the replenishment interval of the supplier, the proposed strategy is able to induce buyers to order in large quantities and hence achieve the objectives of quantity discounts. We show that the proposed strategy can achieve nearly optimal (minimum) system cost, and is much more effective than the existing coordination strategies for decentralized supply chains in the literature.     

Efficient versus Responsive Supply Chain Choice: An Empirical Examination of Influential Factors

Contemporary strategies in operations management suggest that successful firms align supply chain assets with product demand characteristics in order to exploit the profit potential of product lines fully. However, observation suggests that supply chain assets often are longer lived than product line decisions. This suggests that alignment between supply chain assets and demand characteristics is most likely to occur at the time of initial market entry. This article examines the association between product demand characteristics and the initial investment in a supply chain at the time of market entry. We characterize supply chains as responsive or efficient. A responsive supply chain is distinguished by short production lead‐times, low set‐up costs, and small batch sizes that allow the responsive firm to adapt quickly to market demand, but often at a higher unit cost. An efficient supply chain is distinguished by longer production lead‐times, high set‐up costs, and larger batch sizes that allow the efficient firm to produce at a low unit cost, but often at the expense of market responsiveness. We hypothesize that a firm's choice of responsive supply chain will be associated with lower industry growth rates, higher contribution margins, higher product variety, and higher demand or technological uncertainty. We further hypothesize that interactions among these variables either can reinforce or can temper the main effects. We report that lower industry growth rates are associated with responsive market entry, but this effect is offset if growth occurs during periods of high variety and high demand uncertainty. We report that higher contribution margins are associated with responsive market entry and that this effect is more pronounced when occurring with periods of high variety. Finally, we report that responsive market entry also is correlated positively with higher technological demand uncertainty. These results are found using data from the North American mountain bike industry.