Multi-echelon distribution networks are quite common in supply chain and logistics. Deliveries of multiple items from factories to customers aremanagedby routing and consolidating shipments inwarehouses carrying on long-term inventories. On the other hand, cross-docking is a logistics technique that differs from warehousing because products are no longer stored at intermediate depots. Instead, ...

Due to the rapid development of technology in recent years, market competition and customer expectations have increased more than ever. In this situation, it is vital for businesses survival to determine the appropriate policy for inventory control, pricing, and routing, and decisions regarding each of them are often made separately. If the products have a perishable nature, it will be more imp...

This paper reviews inventory models with multiple supply options and discusses their contribution to supply chain management. After discussing strategic aspects of supplier competition and the role of operational flexibility in global sourcing, inventory models which use several suppliers in order to avoid or reduce the effects of shortage situations are outlined. Further, related inventory pro...

We consider ex post demand information sharing and leakage in a two-echelon supply chain consisting of one supplier two retailers competing quantities. The incumbent retailer has an advantage to acquire about the market at cost. If he invests acquisition, privately acquires signal demand. examine incumbent’s incentive acquisition sharing, upstream supplier’s strategy. confirm that decisions dep...

multi-echelon inventory systems are one of the most important and attractive areas in modelling supply chain management so that several researches and studies have been done about. in this paper, the total cost function of a two-echelon inventory system with central warehouse and many identical retailers controlled by continuous review inventory policy is estimated. we have assumed the demand i...

A stream is a continuous version of a supply chain. It is like a series inventory system, but stock can be held at any point along a continuum, not just at discrete stages. We assume stationary parameters and aim to minimize the long-run average total cost. We show that a stationary continuous-stage echelon base-stock policy is optimal. That is, at each geographic point along the supply stream,...

The main purpose of this paper is to study the inventory, production, and contracting decisions of a multi-echelon supply chain with both demand and supply uncertainty. We find that the commonly used wholesale price contracts used by both up-stream and downstream supply-chain members cannot coordinate the system. We then propose a returns policy used by the manufacturer and the retailer, combin...

Abstract—Natural gas, as one of the most important sources of energy for many of the industrial and domestic users all over the world, has a complex, huge supply chain which is in need of heavy investments in all the phases of exploration, extraction, production, transportation, storage and distribution. The main purpose of supply chain is to meet customers’ need efficiently and with minimum co...

We present a two-echelon dual-channel inventory model in which stocks are kept in both a manufacturer warehouse (upper echelon) and a retail store (lower echelon), and the product is available in two supply channels: a traditional retail store and an Internet-enabled direct channel. The system receives stochastic demand from two customer segments: those who prefer the traditional retail store a...