Single Supplier Research Articles

Dynamic discounting program of supply chain finance based on a financial information matching platform

The dynamic discounting (DD) program based on the financial information matching platform (FIMP) is an emerging but underexplored supply chain finance (SCF) model. This study explores the configuration and operation of the DD program, compares and analyzes the DD decision between the traditional model and the FIMP-based DD model, and reveals how the latter model improves the cash flow of participants. Compared with the traditional model, the FIMP-based DD model can improve the accuracy of the daily discount rate for small and medium-sized enterprises; it offers enterprises more capital sources and helps participants determine an optimal payment period. There are three major contributions of this study. First, it explores the mechanism of the platform in promoting the DD model. The DD program is not participated in by a single buyer and supplier, but by one buyer with multiple (N) suppliers based on an FIMP. Once the fundamental decision parameters can be met, several suppliers can enjoy early payment from a specific buyer, thereby improving liquidity of the benefitting participants. Second, the study offers important managerial insights. Suppliers can calculate the discount rate to motivate buyers’ early payment choices. Besides, early payments could be constituted from a mixed portfolio with buyer’s own capital and that from financial institutions. Third, the study explores key parameters. The discount rate is not only related to the cost of working capital but also to the financing costs. Based on the varying relationships between discount rate and capital costs, the present study makes a reasonable argument for the use of mixed funds and then calculates the optimal early payment period. Finally, this study conducts a sensitivity analysis with numerical examples, which finds that, by adopting the FIMP-based DD program, both buyers and suppliers enjoy a fairer procurement environment and more profitable multi-lateral relationships.

Analysis of a JIT Stochastic Inventory System for deteriorating items

This paper provides insights into the management of perishable products from a simulation-inventory modeling perspective. By studying a just-in-time (JIT) inventory system under a single-setup multiple-delivery setting, we propose a new simulation-optimization approach for analyzing JIT purchasing agreements between a single supplier and a single retailer when dealing with randomness. Our findings show that using deterministic inventory models in a stochastic environment can be particularly useful for modeling and optimizing complex inventory systems, i.e., when difficulties arise in characterizing randomness through an analytical model.

Game Analysis of Supply Chain Enterprises’ Choice of Carbon Emission Reduction Behavior under Environmental Regulation and Consumers’ Low Carbon Preference

Under the background of low‐carbon economy, in order to explore the internal mechanism of enterprises implementing carbon emission reduction behavior, this paper uses evolutionary game theory and numerical simulation method to study the evolutionary stability strategy and its influencing factors of carbon emission reduction behavior of supply chain enterprises in a two‐level supply chain composed of a single supplier and a single manufacturer from a dynamic perspective, considering environmental regulation and consumers’ preference for low carbon emission. The results show that there are certain conditions that make supply chain enterprises converge to carbon emission reduction investment behavior under the effect of command‐and‐control environmental regulation and consumer low‐carbon preference, and converge to cooperative carbon emission reduction behavior under the effect of market‐based environmental regulation and consumer low‐carbon preference. On this basis, the factors significantly influence the carbon emission reduction investment behavior of supply chain enterprises are the carbon emission reward and punishment coefficient and the low carbon preference coefficient of consumers. Increasing the carbon tax rate, carbon emission trading price and the proportion of cost subsidies, as well as encouraging consumers to consume low‐carbon products will help promote the realization of cooperative carbon emission reduction.

PERSPECTIVES OF SMALL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT UNDER THE CONDITIONS OF UNCERTAINTY CAUSED BY COVID PANDEMICS

A market economic system based on the means of production is characterized by fundamental uncertainty. The differences between the fundamental uncertainties and the risks lie in the fact that it is impossible to empirically measure the level and dynamics of future threats. A correct understanding of the uncertainty is essential for the study and analysis of the crisis. Under the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic, world economy found itself in a new global crisis, which had a significant impact on the rise of economic and social uncertainty, the degree of which is so high that it is impossible to predict the model of the economic and social development due to the current pandemic. The current economic crisis is characterized not only by global losses but also by the limited sources of compensation. According to scientists (Adžić & Al-Mansour, 2021) a crisis of this magnitude is the most unprecedented economic event of the last century. The COVID-19 world pandemic crisis has limited a traditional opportunities for small business, accordingly has emerged a new one. The most difficult problem was created in the value chain. Small business is a heavily dependent on consumers and suppliers behaviour, therefore, changes in the value chain have a significant impact on all of its participants. The closure of national borders has led to the disruption of the logistics network; And after the reduction of the stocks, it threatens to almost all participants in this network. It is important to consider the uncertainties and risks that are involved while studying small business crisis behavior. As a result even the most trained institutions are approaching disaster. After a pandemic, the universe will find itself in a larger, no less turbulent zone. Prior to the crisis, cost was the most important criterion while choosing a supply chain that had led to single suppliers and small stocks for small businesses. As it seems during the pandemic, this choice turned out to be one of the most important causes of the small business crisis. At the same time, dependence on one supplier has undergone a transformation into the need to diversify stocks, that has led to an increase in funding sources and which has led to the financial instability of a small company. These examples of the correlation between environmental and small business threats have illustrated the need for a global vision in order to adapt anti-crisis behavior model .A global vision is certainly needed. There is no single, optimal choice for overcoming uncertainty, however, the importance of the multivariate strategies is an important. Small firms found themselves unprepared for such approaches, leading to a high level of uncertainty. As well as, when a small business is in the early stages of its life cycle, the lack of experience limits its choice, and the lack of resources prevents it from choosing an effective strategy, that has exacerbated the problems of the small firms.

Energy Policy of the Baltic States in the Post-Soviet Period

The energy policy of the Baltic States in the post-Soviet period, which aims to reduce energy dependence on Russia with an emphasis on promoting national interests is studied at the article.It is noted that the process of the energy sector’ modernizationof Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia is aimed at strengthening energy security and creating conditions for energy independence, increasing the energy efficiency of economies of these countries. The main directions of the energy policy’ implementation of the Baltic States are outlined.Attention is paid to the fact that modernization programs of the energy sector include the widespread introduction of energy saving technologies, in particular, the use of renewable energy sources.
 The conditions of functioning of the Baltic States’ energy systems at the time of independence are considered. We are talking about energy, raw materials, infrastructure dependence on a single energy supplier – the Russian Federation.
 It is noted about the Baltic energy market interconnection plan (BEMIP).The importance of commissioning the LNG terminal in Klaipeda (Lithuania) and the construction of new projects for the transportation of natural gas – GIPL, Balticconnector іs emphasid.Peculiarities of synchronization of electric networks of the Baltic States with the Continental European Network (CEN) are analyzed.A brief description of the energy sector of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in the conditions of independence has been made.
 It is noted about the EU’s position on the development of the Baltic States’energy sector.It is emphasized that the Baltic States have managed to get the support of the EU in their efforts to strengthen energy security.It is concluded that due to the stable position of the Baltic States and the EU in the direction of implementing new projects for energy supply and energy sources, the Baltic States are partially getting rid of energy dependence from Russia.Thanks to EU assistance, the implementation of a common energy policy, the involvement of new partners, the renewal of energy supply routes, and the diversification of energy supply sources, the Baltic States are gradually moving away from energy isolation.

Current trends in pricing for state defense order products

The issues of pricing for products of the state defense order are considered. The classification of methods of procurement of weapons, military and special equipment is given. The main types of contract prices and methods of forming the initial maximum contract price are determined. Particular attention is paid to approaches to pricing for products of the state defense order for the case of a single supplier (contractor, execute). The modern norms of the law are presented, which allow optimizing budget funds by choosing an option that ensures the achievement of technical results and minimizing costs throughout the life cycle of weapons, military and special equipment.

Supplier audits during COVID-19: a process perspective on their transformation and implications for the future

PurposeAudits are an essential part of supply chain management, whether they be of a single supplier's facilities or the whole supply chain. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, auditors mainly conducted supplier audits in-person and on-site. Subsequent travel restrictions have meant that auditors have had to perform these audits remotely. The purpose of this paper is to conceptually describe the emerging phenomenon of remote audits and explore the implications of this change for the future.Design/methodology/approachThis exploratory research used qualitative interviews with key stakeholders (firms, auditors and regulators) to provide an empirical basis for the study. A total of 60 interviews were conducted in two rounds with 40 respondents from 26 organizations. A process perspective lens was used to explore the fundamental changes in supplier audits.FindingsThe study provides an interpretative conceptual framework of remote supplier audits grounded in key factors (audit process, use of technologies, document and record sharing) and identifies a set of contingency factors (technological sophistication, reputation for integrity, maturity of internal audit processes, and level of complexities and risk involved) that affect the effectiveness of remote audits.Originality/valueRemote supplier audits have radically changed how supply chains operate. This paper presents the first empirically-grounded study on remote auditing. It provides a springboard for future research in this domain and practical implications for managers to assist them with the development of remote auditing in their firms and supply chains.

Manufacturer EOQ with Considering Customer Stochastic Demand, Different Inspective Strategies and Raw Material Quality Defect

Single-period newsboy models and the corresponding EOQ models are, respectively, constructed under the condition that the manufacturer inspects raw materials of his supplier with total or sample inspection strategies and the manufacturer repairs or cheaply disposes the defective quality products when single supplier and manufacturer are faced with the customer stochastic demand and quality defects of raw materials. It is also found that marginal effect will be enlarged when unqualified products are disposed at a reduced price. There is a smaller impact to EOQ when manufacturer cheaply disposes the unqualified products when he repairs the products. Under demand-obeying normal distribution, EOQ will be linearly decreasing when the number of unqualified products increases. But EOQ will be linearly increasing when the order is greater than the mean demand and EOQ will also be linearly increasing with the demand standard deviation increase. Finally, the propositions and inferences are confirmed which can exert an impact on EOQ by adopting Monte Carlo simulation software. This research can provide some theoretical basis for manufacturers to reduce internal and external loss costs.

Supplier selection with information disclosure in the presence of uninformed consumers

This paper investigates the impact of consumer's uncertainty as to quality preference on the retailer's supplier selection decision, and on supply chain pricing decisions. When the retailer adopts a single-supplier structure, both informed (knowing quality preference) and uninformed (not knowing quality preference) consumers are in the market, and the retailer has two different market-targeting strategies. An uninformed consumer can be informed by the presentation of two quality-differentiated products supplied by two suppliers, when the retailer selects dual-supplier structure and sells both products. We show that the dual-supplier structure is not always a dominant strategy when there exists a portion of uninformed consumers in the market. The retailer will choose the dual-supplier structure if the proportion of informed consumers is either low or very high, while it will choose a single high-quality supplier to target both consumer groups if the proportion of informed consumers is moderately high. Moreover, the retailer is more likely to adopt the low-price strategy targeting both informed and uninformed consumers when the proportion of the informed consumer in the market is lower; otherwise, it adopts a high-price strategy targeting informed consumers only. The impacts of the consumer's quality preference uncertainty on the retailer's supplier selection and on suppliers under the retailer's optimal supplier selection strategy are also examined. We also include numerical studies to illustrate main results.

Direct versus indirect penalties for supply contracts in high-tech industry

Unlike consumer goods industry, a high-tech manufacturer (OEM) often amortizes new product development costs over multiple generations, where demand for each generation is based on advance orders (i.e., known demand) and additional uncertain demand. Also, due to economic regulatory reasons, high-tech OEMs usually source from a single supplier. Relative to the high retail price, the costs for a supplier of producing high-tech components are low. Consequently, incentives are misaligned: the OEM faces relatively high under-stock costs and the supplier faces high over-stock costs.In this paper, we examine supply contracts that are intended to align the incentives between a high-tech OEM and a supplier so that the supplier will invest adequate and yet non-verifiable capacity to meet the OEM’s demand. When focusing on a single generation, the manufacturer can coordinate a decentralized supply chain and extract all surplus by augmenting a traditional wholesale price contract with a “contingent penalty” should the supplier fail to fulfill the OEM’s demand. When the resulting penalty is too high to be enforceable, we consider a new class of “contingent renewal” wholesale price contracts with a stipulation: the OEM will renew the contract with the incumbent supplier for the next generation only when the supplier can fulfill the demand for the current generation. By using non-renewal as an implicit penalty, we show that the contingent renewal contract can coordinate the supply chain. While the OEM can capture the bulk of the supply chain profit, this innovative contract cannot enable the OEM to extract the entire surplus.

Assigning Suppliers to Meet a Deadline

Most real-world project have a deadline and consist of completing tasks. In our setting, each task needs to be executed by a single supplier, chosen from a subset of suppliers that have the required proficiency to handle that task. The suppliers differ in their execution times, which are stochastically taken from known distributions. The Supplier Assignment for Meeting a Deadline (SAMD) problem is the problem of assigning a supplier to each task in a manner that maximizes the chance to meet the overall project deadline. We propose an A*-based approach, along with an efficient admissible heuristic function, that guarantees an optimal solution for this problem. Experimentally, we compare our A*-based approach to an exhaustive brute-force approach and several heuristic methods. The results show that our A*-based approach compares favorably with the heuristic methods, and is orders of magnitude faster than the exhaustive alternative.

R&D Procurement by Certain Types of Legal Entities Listed in the Federal Law of July 18, 2011 No. 223-FZ

The article provides a brief overview of the general state and structure of the Russian public (regulated) procurement market and the analysis of the public procurement market of R&D by certain types of legal entities listed in the Federal Law of July 18, 2011 No. 223-FZ. Based on the analysis of statistical information on the amount of R&D procurement, their efficiency and structure, it has been concluded that competition in this segment of the regulated procurement market is extremely low: the most part of R&D contracts are concluded through procurement from a single supplier, the efficiency of competitive procedures is extremely low: there are more than a half failed procurements depending on the methods of carrying out in the total volume of purchases. The article presents the most feasible in the author's opinion the reasons for the existing structure of public R&D procurement market.

Three-echelon supply chain model in an imperfect production system with inspection error, learning effect, and return policy under fuzzy environment

This article presents a three-echelon supply chain (SC) model, incorporating a single supplier, a single manufacturer, and a single wholesaler under fuzzy system. Three scenarios have been considered: (a) the learning effect (LE) of the employees on the production cost as well as the return contract (RC) between the supplier and an outside supplier and also between the manufacturer and the wholesaler, (b) without considering the LE on the manufacturing expenses and (c) without the RC between the SC players. The goal of this paper is to study the effect of the LE and the RC on total profit of the SC for centralised and decentralised cases. To adopt flexibility of the demand parameters of the entire process, we develop a fuzzy mathematical model of the proposed SC problem. To discuss the novelty of the proposed model, we insert a table of authors’ contribution and also perform numerical illustrations with the help of LINGO software and make a comparative study between the optimal results of the existing method and the proposed fuzzy approach. Sensitivity analysis and graphical illustrations have also been done for better realisation of the model followed by conclusion.

Ontogenetic dependence of Nile crocodile (Crocodylus niloticus) isotope diet‐to‐tissue discrimination factors

The diet of wild Nile crocodiles (Crocodylus niloticus) is difficult to assess because they are cryptic and nocturnal predators that are extremely sensitive to disturbance by observers, and stomach content analysis is challenging, especially in large specimens. Stable light isotope analysis provides a means of assessing their diet, but diet-to-tissue discrimination factors have yet to be established for the species. Isotope ratio (15 N/14 N and 13 C/12 C expressed as δ15 N and δ13 C) analyses of scutes, claws, and blood of farmed crocodiles of different sizes were compared with the isotope values of their lifelong diet, which comprises chickens from a single supplier. Systematic size dependence in the diet-to-tissue discrimination factors for scute collagen, scute keratin, and claw keratin is described in regression relationships against the snout to vent length. Fixed values are presented for erythrocytes and blood plasma because blood was not sampled from juveniles. The diet-to-tissue discrimination factors help assess the diet of wild crocodiles. The diet of crocodiles from Lake Flag Boshielo shows a clear ontogenic shift, as has been seen in other studies, and the results strongly indicate a dependence on the terrestrial food web rather than a fish diet. That this population may exploit a terrestrial diet highlights potential conflicts for conserving Nile crocodiles outside protected areas.

DIVERSIFICATION OF GAS SUPPLIES AS A CORNERSTONE OF GAS SECURITY IN THE FRAMEWORK OF THE THREE SEAS INITIATIVE

The article overviews approaches to the diversification of gas supplies in the framework of the Three Seas Initiative. The modern geopolitical situation in Eastern and Central Europe is characterized by transformation processes in the energy sector. Due to the implementation of decarbonization policy in the European Union and subsequent shift from coal as a main energy source, a need in alternative fuel sources, such as natural gas, emerges. Therefore, a significant increase in natural gas consumption is expected, which raises a number of issues, such as dependence on a single gas supplier and orientation of the EU’s gas transmission system in East-West direction only. This issue is crucial for Eastern and Central European states, due to the underdeveloped gas infrastructure in the region and heavy dependence on a single gas supplier, such as Russia or Turkey. Hence, the Three Seas Initiative is considered as a powerful tool, designed to develop energy, transport and digital infrastructure of the region in the North-South direction, where one of the most potentially promising projects within the framework of the Three Seas Initiative is represented by the development of gas infrastructure, aimed at solving the diversification of supplies in the gas market in Eastern and Central Europe. The implementation of developed gas infrastructure and diversification of gas supplies consists of several regional projects that are relevant for those countries in the region in which they are implemented in particular and for all member states of the Three Seas Initiative in general. The main purpose of the implementation of these projects is the creation of a unified natural gas transportation infrastructure in Eastern Europe along the North-South axis. The result of such a grand reorganization in the field of gas supplies to Europe will be an increase in the number of independent suppliers in the European gas market and a decrease in the dependence of the EU countries on gas supplies from Russia. In the article, the author traced in detail the tendency of the formation of energy infrastructure along the North-South axis with focus on the projects that are being implemented by each of the participating countries within the framework of the Three Seas Initiative. This approach allows to assess the scale and integrity of the gas transportation infrastructure, that is being created in the Eastern Europe region and its contribution to the common European energy security policy.

The implications of contract timing on a supply chain with random yield

We investigate the impact of contract timing on a random yield supply chain consisting of a single buyer and multiple unreliable suppliers. In this supply chain, the buyer decides the order quantity and the suppliers decide the capacity levels which depend on the random yield rates. According to the sequence of these two decisions, we consider two contracts. If the buyer places the order prior to the supplier's capacity decision, we call it EA (ex-ante) contract. On the other hand, if the supplier's capacity decision comes first, we call it EP (ex-post) contract. Two different effects, the Ex-ante Ordering Effect and the Risk Pooling Effect are identified. The Ex-ante Ordering Effect represents that the buyer will increase the order quantity compared to the benchmark case with no random yield in both one-supplier and multiple-supplier settings under EA contract. The Risk Pooling Effect indicates that the buyer will increase the total order quantity as the number of unreliable suppliers increases in the multiple-supplier setting under both EA and EP contracts. As the number of unreliable suppliers increases, the reduction of supply uncertainty from suppliers will induce the buyer to increase the total order quantity. Furthermore, we show that the supplier prefers EA contract only if the number of suppliers is small, whereas the buyer unambiguously prefers EA contract because of the first-move advantage in the game. That is, both the buyer and supplier are better off from the buyer's ordering decision prior to the supplier's capacity decision in the one-supplier setting. However, in case of multiple suppliers, the buyer still prefers to order first, whereas the suppliers should decide the capacity investment first if the number of competitive suppliers is large.

Value and incentives for adoption of Blockchain technology for a single supplier multiple retailer networks

Studies on the adoption of Blockchain technology (BT) in supply chains have recently gained considerable importance because BT can enable secure, scalable, reliable, and traceable information sharing among partners. In this paper, the value of the adoption of BT is analysed in a single supplier and multi-retailer arrangement wherein the demand at retailers could be correlated. The newsvendor model and game theory are used to analyse the expected profit generated by the supplier and retailers from the adoption of BT. The demand pattern (stationary or nonstationary) and structure (number of retailers participating in a private/permissioned BT) affect BT adoption in a single supplier and multi-retailer supply chain coordination. The retailer's incentive increases when more number of retailers with independent demand participates in the BT framework.

The integrated uncapacitated lot sizing and bin packing problem

In the integrated uncapacitated lot sizing and bin packing problem, we have to couple lot sizing decisions of replenishment from single product suppliers with bin packing decisions in the delivery of client orders. A client order is composed of quantities of each product, and the quantities of such an order must be delivered all together no later than a given period. The quantities of an order must all be packed in the same bin, and may be delivered in advance if it is advantageous in terms of costs. We assume a large enough set of homogeneous bins available at each period. The costs involved are setup and inventory holding costs and the cost to use a bin as well. All costs are variable in the planning horizon, and the objective is to minimize the total cost incurred. We propose mixed integer linear programming formulations and a combinatorial relaxation where it is no longer necessary to keep track of the specific bin where each order is packed. An aggregate delivering capacity is computed instead. We also propose heuristics using different strategies to couple the lot sizing and the bin packing subproblems. Computational experiments on instances with different configurations showed that the proposed methods are efficient ways to obtain small optimality gaps in reduced computational times.

Research on the Impact of Cloud Manufacturing Platform Pricing Strategies on the Profit of Single Channel Suppliers

Based on the Hotelling model, this paper compares the profit of single-channel transactions between the cloud supplier on the cloud manufacturing platform and the offline supplier with the manufacturer. It studies how the cloud manufacturing platform formulates the transaction charging coefficient so that the profit of the cloud supplier is greater than the profit of the offline supplier and guarantees its own profit, thereby attracting more suppliers to the cloud. And further consider the impact on supplier profit and cloud manufacturing platform revenue when the manufacturer’s value perception coefficient changes, provide reasonable suggestions for cloud manufacturing platform pricing, and provide cloud suppliers with strategies to attract manufacturers.

Why Abandon the Paradise? Stations\u2019 Incentives to Reduce Gasoline Prices at First

The German petrol station market is characterized by strong intraday price cycles, which probably correspond to the well-known Edgeworth cycles. The prices go up strongly in the late evening or in the middle of the night, fall relatively heavily in the early morning, and then go up and down several times in the course of the day. Locally, the analysis is limited to the 26 petrol stations that plausibly form a common market in the Lueneburg region. This paper picks out the specific sequence in which, after generally rising prices during the day, a single supplier is the first to reverse the price trend and lower its price. For this purpose, current price reports are used to define the price reduction event down to the second, and to show only the valid prices of competitors prior to the event. All German petrol stations have to report price changes to the Bundeskartellamt's Market Transparency Department. Tankerkoenig then publishes the full reports. This results in one panel observation for each price reduction event. Out of nearly 300,000 price observations, just over 10,000 panel observations result. Fixed-effect logit estimates are used to test whether the theoretically and economically significant price differences of the Edgeworth cycles explain the behavior of the price cutters, or whether market structure factors, such as brand affiliation/independence of the petrol station, service offerings, or location characteristics predict price-cutting behavior. The novel recording of the price dynamics in the petrol station market by using the accurate petrol station price data to the second indicates promising research of extensive price data and avoids the enormous loss of information in the previously common calculation of average prices at certain times.