More firms than ever before are disclosing the provenance of their products, results of product testing, and suppliers’ compliance with labor‐practice norms in their annual reports, sustainability reports, and press releases, besides making such information available on third‐party websites. However, collecting and disclosing such information is not only costly but also does not provide clear benefits. While the terminology is not yet standard in the literature, this study distinguishes supply chain transparency from visibility. Here, visibility refers to managers’ efforts to learn more about operations upstream in their supply chains. In contrast, by transparency, we mean a company disclosing information to consumers, investors, and other stakeholders about compliance with consumer‐expected norms in its supply chain operations and products. To motivate further research on supply chain transparency, we first report recent examples of companies providing supply chain transparency. Then we present potential benefits of supply chain visibility and supply chain transparency, respectively, for the company. Finally, we propose topics for research on supply chain transparency arranged by stakeholder.
Battery-powered electric cars (BEVs) play a key role in future mobility scenarios. However, little is known about the environmental impacts of the production, use and disposal of the lithium ion (Li-ion) battery. This makes it difficult to compare the environmental impacts of BEVs with those of internal combustion engine cars (ICEVs). Consequently, a detailed lifecycle inventory of a Li-ion battery and a rough LCA of BEV based mobility were compiled. The study shows that the environmental burdens of mobility are dominated by the operation phase regardless of whether a gasoline-fueled ICEV or a European electricity fueled BEV is used. The share of the total environmental impact of E-mobility caused by the battery (measured in Ecoindicator 99 points) is 15%. The impact caused by the extraction of lithium for the components of the Li-ion battery is less than 2.3% (Ecoindicator 99 points). The major contributor to the environmental burden caused by the battery is the supply of copper and aluminum for the production of the anode and the cathode, plus the required cables or the battery management system. This study provides a sound basis for more detailed environmental assessments of battery based E-mobility.
Platform owners employ strategic promotions (e.g., platform-initiated penetration pricing) to enlarge their customer base. Under the conventional price-driven economic logic, such promotions are expected to divert demand for the identical goods away from competing platforms, as extensively documented in the conventional brick-and-mortar store context. However, they can also boost the demand. In environments where customers can easily access the identical goods on competing platforms, the increased awareness by strategic promotion, coupled with other non-price factors, can stimulate the purchases of such goods on competing platforms. As such, the effect of strategic promotions on competitive dynamics remains unclear despite their importance for platforms and today’s intensifying platform competition. We utilize the context of online PC game marketplaces where Steam and Epic Games Store dominate. Using the synthetic control approach, our analysis finds that the strategic promotion by Epic Games Store, which offers selected games for free for a week, rather increases the sales of the identical games on Steam substantially (by 59.2%) during that week. In essence, although consumers could obtain the games for free on the promoting platform, more consumers purchased the identical games on the competing platform than before. To comprehensively understand the drivers and conditions of this phenomenon, we perform complementary analysis based on the Attention-Interest-Desire-Action framework, following the progression of consumers’ cross-platform purchase decision process. Using consumer survey and product review data, along with the decomposition of the treatment effect, our results suggest that the effect is more prominent when the price gap between platforms is small and externalities between users or between goods offered by Steam are high. Taken together, our study unveils a unique aspect of strategic promotion in the context of platform competition and highlights the crucial role of externalities in shaping the competitive landscape of digital platforms.
The first‐sale doctrine, which protects consumers’ rights to resell purchased products, has been recognized by the US Supreme Court since 1908. In recent years, consumers have begun to purchase an increasing amount of virtual goods, which renders the first‐sale doctrine unclear. There are two main challenges leading to the uncertainty of the first‐sale doctrine in the digital age: lack of proper technology, and economic implications for developers and consumers. The advent of the blockchain solves the technology challenge, as it can track provenance and establish the chain of custody. In this study, we construct an analytical model to investigate the economic impact of trading preowned virtual items. Specifically, our model captures the decentralized nature of blockchain technology by allowing consumer‐to‐consumer trading, and considers the possibility that consumers prefer preowned virtual items over new ones because preowned items may be upgraded between purchase and resale. Lawmakers seek to strike a balance between the interests of virtual item developers and individual consumers. We show that, surprisingly, the introduction of a blockchain‐based preowned virtual item transaction can actually benefit both developer and consumer. The main intuition is that the developer can adjust the price when forward‐looking consumers incorporate the expected future transaction into their purchase decision. Our analysis also reveals that developers are more willing to embrace the secondary market when they can take a cut during the transaction. Our results provide important policy implications to the burgeoning debate of the first‐sale doctrine in the new digital world.
ABSTRACT This paper focuses on the dynamic flexible job shop scheduling problem with constrained maintenance resources (DFJSP‐CMR), a pressing challenge in modern manufacturing systems. As traditional rigid scheduling models fall short in meeting the demands of today's dynamic production environments, there is a growing need for intelligent approaches that can seamlessly integrate production scheduling and maintenance planning under resource limitations. To tackle this challenge, we propose a novel hybrid algorithm aimed at minimising makespan while addressing machine deterioration, unexpected failures and constrained maintenance resources. The core of our approach is a deep Q‐network with maintenance insertion algorithm (DQN‐MI) specifically designed for efficient maintenance scheduling. The algorithm features a 5×3 action space, constructed as compound rules, along with a reward structure that balances machine utilisation efficiency with effective maintenance operations. Extensive computational experiments conducted on diverse problem instances demonstrate that DQN‐MI delivers superior performance, further validating the effectiveness and versatility of the proposed method in addressing complex scheduling challenges while maintaining the stability and reliability of manufacturing systems. This research contributes to the advancement of intelligent manufacturing by presenting a robust and practical solution for the integrated management of production scheduling and maintenance planning.
“Cloud Kitchens” are delivery-only facilities that house multiple restaurants. Food-delivery platforms operate such kitchens to exploit two advantages: (a) Location advantage, arising due to a cloud-kitchen’s central location—this enables lower delivery times to customers. (b) Consolidation advantage, which accrues when multiple restaurants choose to co-locate at the cloud kitchen—this enables the platform to use a common pool of delivery drivers, thereby reducing costs. However, a cloud-kitchen’s eventual impacts on both the restaurants and the platform are intricately connected through their respective decisions—namely, the restaurants’ location decisions and the platform’s delivery capacity and delivery time. We examine conditions under which a cloud kitchen simultaneously benefits the primary stakeholders: delivery platform, restaurants, and customers. Our game-theoretic analysis considers two restaurants and a delivery platform. The restaurants simultaneously decide whether to stay at their initial (extreme) locations or relocate to a centrally located cloud kitchen. The platform decides the driver headcount and the delivery times for customers. In line with industry trends, we show that as population density increases beyond a threshold, the restaurants co-locating at the cloud kitchen is first a Pareto-dominant equilibrium and then the unique equilibrium. The platform and customers also prefer this equilibrium, leading to a win-win-win for the stakeholders. A cloud-kitchen’s benefit to the platform further increases as the drivers’ operational environment becomes more constrained, i.e. drivers’ carry-limit and speed decrease, and driver cost increases.
How to decarbonize transportation, which is now, unfortunately, the largest source of carbon emissions among all sectors? The entire industry is heavily driven by economies of scale. When more freight is collected in a lane, it can be shifted to a greener transport mode (e.g., from less-than-truckload to full-truckload, and further to rail transport), and costs and emissions are saved. To support firms achieving such benefits, we develop novel supply chain contracting models that capture supply chain partners’ strategic orders, as well as freight transportation modes with trade-offs on costs, emissions, and flexibility (in the form of a minimum transport quantity for the green mode). We find that even a conventional price-only contract with an option to shift freight mode can already boost the use of the green transport mode and considerably improve supply chain efficiency. Furthermore, we design a revenue-sharing contract that can incentivize even larger order quantities from the retailer and strongly promote the use of the green transport mode. We characterize the conditions under which the contract can achieve a win–win situation, that is, increasing economic as well as environmental sustainability of the supply chain. In a follow-up case study using realistic industry-level data, we numerically evaluate how the supply chain parameters affect this win–win situation.
Marcos Vido, Athos Paulo Tadeu Pacchini , Wagner Cesar Lucato
et al.
Tradicionalmente, a manufatura se baseava em uma economia linear, extraindo, fabricando, utilizando e descartando recursos, levando o planeta em direção à exaustão dos recursos. A Indústria 4.0 introduz tecnologias habilitadoras que podem promover estratégias circulares, enfrentando o desafio de reduzir o uso de recursos não renováveis. Este estudo modela um framework conceitual aplicando tecnologias digitais a uma economia circular, revisando sistematicamente a literatura específica utilizando a metodologia PRISMA. Os dados foram coletados por meio de estudos de caso envolvendo quatro empresas dos setores automotivo, eletrônico e de calçados. Os resultados confirmam a Internet das Coisas (IoT) e o Big Data como tecnologias cruciais para aplicações da economia circular. A integração bem-sucedida dessas tecnologias na Indústria 4.0 está prestes a melhorar a sustentabilidade industrial em vários setores de manufatura.
Production management. Operations management, Production capacity. Manufacturing capacity
Abstract This study estimates the association between the level of biosecurity, animal welfare, milk quality, and economic performance on 2291 mountain dairy farms which largely differs in management and structure from large dairy operations in the lowlands mainly due to climatic and topographic constraints in mountain areas. The dairy industry’s increasing emphasis on biosecurity is crucial for ensuring animal health, productivity, and disease mitigation. Therefore, in the present study the biosecurity and animal welfare status of mountain dairy farms were assessed considering the official welfare protocol for dairy cows of the Italian ClassyFarm system. Our findings reveal a suboptimal adoption of biosecurity measures, attributed to structural limitations in mountain farms and farmers’ awareness gaps. Despite these challenges, the economic significance of biosecurity adoption is evident, emphasizing potential benefits for farm viability and animal health. Conversely, the study indicates a moderate to good welfare status in assessed farms, reflecting farmers’ awareness of the importance of high welfare standards for dairy cows. Improved welfare positively correlates with milk sales and productivity, highlighting the economic advantages of prioritizing animal well-being. Challenges persist, particularly regarding animal housing deficiencies and related consumer concerns about animal welfare in dairy production. Therefore, targeted interventions and educational initiatives are crucial to empower farmers and promote best practices in biosecurity and animal welfare management. However, addressing resultant production cost increases necessitates society’s willingness to pay more for animal-based food, emphasizing the importance of aligning economic incentives with sustainable farming practices.
Platforms provide great opportunities for independent sellers to experiment with new products. By facilitating transactions between trading parties, platforms can gather a huge amount of information about successful products and introduce their own versions of competing products. This phenomenon of platform encroachment has received attention from various stakeholders, and concerns have been raised about how it may marginalize independent sellers and hinder the development of the ecosystem. At the same time, platforms expedite the diffusion of information about successful products and facilitate learning and imitation from other independent sellers, which has received little attention in the literature. In this article, we explicitly account for this feature and consider a dynamic model to study the impact of platform encroachment on sellers’ incentives to experiment with new products, when both the platform and independent sellers can imitate and introduce competing versions of products offered by the successful experimenter. We show that when a seller with successful experimentation holds a competitive advantage in the product market, platform encroachment may enhance the incentives to carry out experimentation. This enhancement effect is stronger when information diffuses faster on the platform. We further discuss the implications for the platform’s optimal encroachment strategy and regulatory policies.
We examine competing brands' incentive to offer a self‐designable package that consumers can modify to ensure fit, in addition to offering a standard, pre‐configured product. While “amateurs” with low self‐design capability prefer a standard, pre‐configured product and can have strong preference for a particular brand, “experts” with high self‐design capability prefer a self‐designable package and tend to be indifferent between competing brands. First, we find that asymmetric equilibrium can arise where only one brand offers a self‐designable package and the other brand offers a standard product only. That is, brands can avoid the lose–lose situation, where both offer the self‐designable package but intensified price competition makes both lose profit. This lose–lose situation can be completely avoided when the two brands offer self‐designable packages that are completely nondifferentiated, but may arise in equilibrium and cause the “prisoner's dilemma” when the packages are slightly differentiated. Second, we show that between two competing brands whose standard products have different attractions, the less powerful brand that offers the less attractive standard product is more likely to be the only provider of the self‐designable package. Finally, we find that consumer surplus can be greater when the more powerful brand is the only provider of the self‐designable package than when the less powerful brand is the only provider.
We consider a periodic review single‐item inventory model under stochastic demand. Every m periods, in the regular order period, fixed order costs are K . In the periods in‐between, the intraperiods, higher fixed order costs of L > K $L>K$ apply. The literature on optimal inventory policies under fixed order costs does not account for these time‐dependent fixed order costs. By generalizing existing proofs for optimal inventory policies, we close this gap in inventory theory. The optimal inventory policy is complex in the regular order period and in the intraperiods, a period‐dependent ( s , S ) $(s,S)$ policy is optimal. We describe and prove this optimal policy based on the notion of K ‐convexity and the optimal ordering behavior in the presence of non– K ‐convex cost functions. In a numerical study, we find that a major driver of the optimal policy is a forward‐buying effect that shifts the probability of ordering from the intraperiods to the regular order period. The cost differences between the optimal and a pure period‐dependent ( s , S ) $(s,S)$ policy are, however, small.
Increasing demand for agricultural products and production of resource constraints- especially the limitation of cultivable areas - have made the highest yield per unit area the main goal of agricultural producers. Agriculture is a system exhibiting high energy consumption and production. Since energy has a direct impact on the efficiency of crop production, a sustainable agricultural system needs to be analyzed in terms of its input and output energy to determine the total consumed energy of production per unit area. The difference between input and output energy determines energy efficiency of an agronomical system. Input energy requires being well analyzed to reduce energy consumption and increase energy efficiency. This paper reviews energy efficiency indices based on energy consumption during planting and harvesting. To enhance energy efficiency of agronomical systems, some strategies are discussed in detail, including using high quality seeds, minimum tillage systems, direct seeded rice, weeds control especially in irrigation canals and plant nutrition through agronomical management. Although some agronomical strategies -like complementary irrigation in dry land farming systems- increase input energy, they increase crop yield. However, when output energy, resulting from the rise in crop yield, is higher than input energy, the system energy efficiency improves. Still, some inputs cannot be altered according to regional conditions which are often related to harvest stages operations.
Noor Suraya Romali, Fatin Afiqah Binti Ardzu, Muhamad Nurfaizal Suzany
Urbanization is one of the leading causes of urban flooding as rapid development produces more impervious areas in cities. The application of green roofs is regarded as an effective technology to minimize the adverse effects of urban development. The stormwater management capacities of green roofs have been extensively acknowledged, and they can retain rainfall and detain runoff. Nevertheless, Malaysia has experienced few green roof applications, and only limited literature is available concerning such topics. Additionally, the incorporation of waste and recycled material in green roof designs must be considered to ensure such projects benefit the environment as well as the economy. Therefore, the construction of a green roof utilizing recycled waste materials was attempted. An extensive green roof was constructed using beach morning glory and creeping ox-eye plants as vegetation layers, along with coconut waste, i.e., coconut fiber and coconut shell, as the medium for the filter and drainage layer, respectively. According to the results, the use of recycled coconut waste materials in the green roof operations reduced the peak flow by as much as 86%, while the use of commercial materials led to a reduction of 67%.
HIGHLIGHTS
The novelty of this study are:
The utilization of coconut waste as the green roof materials.;
The production of burnt-crushed coconut shell as the drainage layer material.;
The use of coconut fiber to replace the non-woven geotextile used in the filter layer.;
A sustainable and economical green roof using a recycled waste material.;
Able to improve peak flow of surface runoff up to 86% reduction.;
Peizheng Li, Jonathan Thomas, Xiaoyang Wang
et al.
Radio access network (RAN) technologies continue to evolve, with Open RAN gaining the most recent momentum. In the O-RAN specifications, the RAN intelligent controllers (RICs) are software-defined orchestration and automation functions for the intelligent management of RAN. This article introduces principles for machine learning (ML), in particular, reinforcement learning (RL) applications in the O-RAN stack. Furthermore, we review the state-of-the-art research in wireless networks and cast it onto the RAN framework and the hierarchy of the O-RAN architecture. We provide a taxonomy for the challenges faced by ML/RL models throughout the development life-cycle: from the system specification to production deployment (data acquisition, model design, testing and management, etc.). To address the challenges, we integrate a set of existing MLOps principles with unique characteristics when RL agents are considered. This paper discusses a systematic model development, testing and validation life-cycle, termed: RLOps. We discuss fundamental parts of RLOps, which include: model specification, development, production environment serving, operations monitoring and safety/security. Based on these principles, we propose the best practices for RLOps to achieve an automated and reproducible model development process. At last, a holistic data analytics platform rooted in the O-RAN deployment is designed and implemented, aiming to embrace and fulfil the aforementioned principles and best practices of RLOps.
Silvio Aparecido da Silva, Andréa Cristina Konrath, Antônio Cezar Bornia
O objetivo deste artigo é aplicar uma heurística para localização de p-medianas, no sentido de identificar os melhores locais para instalação de Institutos Federais no estado de Santa Catarina, de maneira a minimizar custos com transporte. Foram utilizados três cenários: o primeiro considera a população do estado de Santa Catarina, enquanto o segundo, o número de alunos que completaram o Ensino Fundamental e o Ensino Médio. Já o terceiro cenário considera a taxa de analfabetismo. A otimização foi feita por meio da heurística de Teitz e Bart das p-medianas. A heurística Teiz e Bart demonstrou ser uma excelente aproximação para o problema das p-medianas e apresentou um excelente resultado para tomada de decisão na administração pública.
Production management. Operations management, Production capacity. Manufacturing capacity
This study provides key arguments and contributions of Kuhn (1970) concerning paradigms, paradigm shifts, and scientific revolutions. We provide interpretations of Kuhn's (1970) key ideas and concepts, especially as they relate to business management research. We conclude by considering the practical implications of paradigms and paradigm shifts for contemporary business management researchers and suggest that ethical rules of conversation are at least as critical for the health of a scientific community as methodological rules (e.g., the rules of logical positivism) derived from the philosophy of science.
In recent decades, the use of heavy machinery in forest management has increased, causing compaction and alternations in soil morphology. As soil vulnerability to compaction is highly dependent on the type of soil and the current soil water content, rapid assessment of the suitability of the conditions for the use of machinery is of great importance for practice. The article discusses methods for rapidly determining the mechanical properties of soil. We tested the soil clump method, which was supplemented by the assessment of the appearance of the hand and handprint during preparation of the soil clumps, soil water content measurements and determination of the lower and upper limits of soil plasticity. The following soil types, which are common in Slovenian forest stands, were selected: brown soil on limestone and dolomite (Eutric Cambisol), dystric brown soil (Dystric Cambisol) and hypogley (Eutric Gleysol). The results of the study showed that, when dropped, the surface area of the clump increases with the water content of the soil, while at the same time the appearance of the clump, the soil residue on the hands and the appearance of the handprint change. Evaluation of the appearance of the hands and handprint represent supplements to the existing clump method, but can also be an alternative to it, as they can be both used independently. By determining the lower and upper limits of plasticity or soil strength, we indirectly assessed the risk of soil damage in forest production. Through the use of soil condition indicators, such as the appearance of the soil clump, the soil residue on the hands and the appearance of the handprint, we can quickly and easily assess the current working conditions in practise and thus prevent excessive soil deformation in forest operations.