No / This paper presents a stochastic automaton approach to stock ordering for retailers of time-limited goods, in the modern supply chain network. The rationale applied is that by ordering in small quantities frequently, overstocking will be reduced, capital liquidity improved and wastage limited. A consequence for the complete supply chain is that such an approach could substantially minimise the reactive bullwhip effect, leading to more efficient utilisation, production and agility throughout the chain. Such agility and flexibility can only be achieved by full integration of stock inventory monitoring technologies (such as RFID) with enterprise integration systems (such as ERP) connected to suppliers, mediated by the internet. We undertake a comparative simulation study of stock ordering using a stochastic automaton and a naive traditional approach. This shows that stochastic ordering, prompted by a stochastic automaton, exhibits characteristic properties that are a prerequisite for reducing the bullwhip effect, thus enabling agile inventory management.

In vehicle industry, it has been trends towards focusing on pull-basedsystems and elimination of waste (Lean), which decrease the tied-up capitallevel in the focal factory. Research by Holweg & Miemczyk (2002)showed that the relevant supply chain has low inventory level in the focalfactory, but at upstream and especially downstream; the tied-up capitallevel is dramatically higher in comparison to the focal factory.By conducting research and extensive literature reviews, this volatilityof tied-up capital level has been studied and analysed with regard topush and pull systems. As the three main causes of this unevenness; bullwhipeffect, CODP position in supply chain and intensity level of supplierrelationship have been identified and explained.As a practical solution for decreasing the tied-up capital level of finishedvehicles, implementation of centralised warehouse structure hasbeen suggested and discussed.Moreover, as an application of game theory in logistics, iterated prisoners’dilemma has been discussed as the base for a progressive relationshipwith suppliers (upgrading to win-win game) which is requisite for the successof pull-based supply chains. / Program: BSc in Industrial Engineering - International Business Engineering

Wiss. Hochsch. für Unternehmensführung, Diss.--Vallendar, 2004.

No description available.

Globalization and the surge of competition across industries forced companies to improve their supply chain capabilities to serve their customers efficiently and effectively. Due to this fact, businesses are no longer capable of handling all supply chain operations without collaboration and coordination with other firms. One of the key obstacles to coordination is the lack of information sharing and trust between firms since they view information as a sensitive asset. Digital technologies like blockchain, with its inherited features, have the capability to facilitate real-time information sharing, solve trust issues, and improve end-to-end visibility across the supply chain. This licentiate thesis highlights the impact of multiple aspects of information sharing on the bullwhip effect mitigation and explores the potential of blockchain technology as a new coordination mechanism for reducing information distortions, enhancing trust, and orchestrating decision making. Three research papers have been produced within this context and are appended to the thesis. Paper A presents an information sharing-based blockchain architecture to mitigate the bullwhip effect in service supply chains. Paper B aims to explores the literature in terms of using multiple aspects of information sharing to lessen the bullwhip effect. Finally, Paper C introduces an agent-based modeling and simulation approach for two aspects of information sharing: “what to share” and “how to share.” The results show that blockchain technology does provide a significant solution to trust-based issues and information sharing visibility considering the bullwhip effect mitigation. The results also provide a guide for supply chain managers to achieve better coordination and serve as a roadmap for supply chain researchers.

This dissertation is a collection of essays on challenges in international trade and international finance, which apply econometric methods to diverse data sets and relate them to economic policy questions. In times of crises, the question, whether individual countries have the ability to pursue idiosyncratic monetary policy, is important. The degree of integration and comovement between financial markets, for instance, is critical to better assess the real threat facing a country in a crisis. Also, from a macroeconomic modeling perspective, there has recently been a renewed interest in the cyclical and long-run comovement of interest rates. Hence, in a first essay, we reinvestigate the long- and short-run comovements in the G7-countries by conducting tests for cointegration, common serial correlation and codependence with nominal and real interest rates. Overall, we only find little evidence of comovements: common trends are occasionally observed, but the majority of interest rates are not cointegrated. Although some evidence for codependence of higher order can be found in the pre-Euro area sample, common cycles appear to exist only in rare cases. We argue that some earlier, more positive findings in the literature are difficult to reconcile due to differing assumptions about the underlying stochastic properties of interest rates. Hence, we conclude that they cannot be generalized for all interest rates, time periods, and reasonable alternative estimation procedures. This finding indicates that scope for individual countries to pursue stabilization policy does still exist in a globalized world. Emerging economies, in general, are much more exposed and vulnerable to crises than industrialized countries. Accordingly, stabilization policy is especially important in these countries and the selection of the best monetary regime is essential. This is why, in a second essay, we contrast two different views in the debate on official dollarization: the Mundell (1961) framework of optimum currency areas and a model on boom-bust cycles by Schneider and Tornell (2004), who take account of credit market imperfections prevalent in middle income countries. We highlight the strikingly different role of the exchange rate in the two models. While in the Mundell framework the exchange rate is expected to smooth the business cycle, the second model predicts the exchange rate to play an amplifying role. We empirically evaluate both models for eight highly dollarized Central American economies. We document the existence of credit market imperfections and find that shocks from the exchange rate indeed amplify business cycles in these countries. Using a new method proposed by Cubadda (1999 and 2007), we furthermore test for cyclical comovement and reject the hypothesis that the selected countries form an optimum currency area with the United States according to the Mundell definition. In the context of the recent global crisis, globalization and vertical integration in particular were often blamed for being the cause for the severe trade crisis. For that reason, in the essay that contributes to the trade literature, we analyze the role of international supply chains in explaining the long-run trade elasticity and its short-term volatility in the context of the recent trade collapse. We adopt an empirical strategy based on two steps: first, stylized facts on long- and short-term trade elasticity are derived from exploratory analysis and formal modeling on a large and diversified sample of countries. Then, we derive observations of interrelated input-output matrices for a demonstrative sub-set of countries. We find evidence for two supply chain related factors to explain the overshooting of trade elasticity during the 2008-2009 trade collapse: the composition and the bullwhip effect. However, evidence for a magnification effect could not be found. Overall, we do not accept the hypothesis that international supply chains explain all by themselves the changes in trade-income elasticity.