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The wedge-tailed green pigeon (Treron sphenurus) has a protective value in the evolution of the family Columbidae. In this study, the complete mitogenome of T. sphenurus from Baise City, China, which represents the first sequenced species of the genus Treron in Tribe Treronini, is reported. This was accomplished using PCR-based methods and a primer-walking sequencing strategy with genus-specific primers. The mitogenome was found to be 18,919 bp in length comprising 37 genes, including 13 protein-coding genes, two rRNA genes, 22 tRNA genes, and one control region. In terms of structure and composition, many similarities were found between the T. sphenurus and Hemiphaga novaeseelandiae (New Zealand pigeon) mitogenomes. This was further supported by phylogenetic analysis showing that T. sphenurus has a close evolutionary relationship with H. novaeseelandiae. The complete mitogenome of T. sphenurus reported here is expected to provide valuable molecular information for further studies on the phylogeny of the genus Treron and for analyses of the taxonomic status of the family Columbidae. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2006.08.001 Byline: Yong-Wu Zhou Keywords: Discount pricing; Asymmetric information; Price-sensitive demand; Stackelberg game Abstract: In this paper, we study quantity discount pricing policies in a channel of one manufacturer and one retailer. The paper assumes that the channel faces a stochastic price-sensitive demand but the retailer can privately observe the realization of an uncertain demand parameter. The problem is analyzed as a Stackelberg game in which the manufacturer declares quantity discount pricing schemes to the retailer and then the retailer follows by selecting the retail price and associated quantity. Proposed in the paper are four quantity-discount pricing policies: 'regular quantity discount'; 'fixed percentage discount'; 'incremental volume discount' and 'fixed marginal-profit-rate discount'. Optimal solutions are derived, and numerical examples are presented to illustrate the efficiency of each discount policy. Author Affiliation: Institute of Logistics and Supply Chain Management, School of Management, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, Anhui 230009, People's Republic of China Article History: Received 24 June 2006

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2006.04.013 Byline: Yong-Wu Zhou (a), Sheng-Dong Wang (b) Keywords: Production; Inventory; Shipment; Shortage Abstract: This paper develops a more general production-inventory model for a single-vendor-single-buyer integrated system. Unlike the hitherto existing production-inventory models for the vendor-buyer system, the present model neither requires the buyer's unit holding cost greater than the vendor's nor assumes the structure of shipment policy. Secondly, the model is extended to the situation with shortages permitted, based on shortages being allowed to occur only for the buyer. Thirdly, the paper also presents a corresponding production-inventory model for a deteriorating item for the integrated system. The solution procedures are provided for finding the optimal production and shipment policies and illustrated with numerical examples. Three significant insights are shown: (1) no matter whether the buyer's unit holding cost is greater than the vendor's or not, the present model always performs best in reducing the average total cost as compared to the hitherto existing models; (2) if the buyer's unit holding cost is less than the vendor's, the optimal shipment policy for the integrated system will only comprise shipments with successive shipment sizes increasing by a fixed factor. It is different from that obtained by Hill [Hill, R.M., 1999. The optimal production and shipment policy for the single-vendor single-buyer integrated production-inventory problem. International Journal of Production Research 37, 2463-2475] for the opposite case; (3) when designing a single-vendor-single-buyer integrated system, making the buyer's unit holding cost lower than the vendor's is more beneficial to the system if shortages are not permitted to occur; otherwise it just reverses. Author Affiliation: (a) Institute of Logistics and Supply Chain Management, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, Anhui 230009, People's Republic of China (b) Department of Mathematics, Electronic Engineering Institute of PLA, Hefei, Anhui 230037, People's Republic of China Article History: Received 2 October 2005; Accepted 12 April 2006

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2005.06.054 Byline: Amy Hing Ling Lau (a), Hon-Shiang Lau (b)(c), Yong-Wu Zhou (d) Keywords: Supply chain; Stackelberg game; Information asymmetry Abstract: Consider a dominant manufacturer wholesaling a product to a retailer, who in turn retails it to the consumers at $p/unit. The retail-market demand volume varies with p according to a given demand curve. This basic system is commonly modeled as a manufacturer-Stackelberg ([mS]) game under a 'deterministic and symmetric-information' ('det-sym-i') framework. We first explain the logical flaws of this framework, which are (i) the dominant manufacturer-leader will have a lower profit than the retailer under an iso-elastic demand curve; (ii) in some situations the system's 'correct solution' can be hyper-sensitive to minute changes in the demand curve; (iii) applying volume discounting while keeping the original [mS] profit-maximizing objective leads to an implausible degenerate solution in which the manufacturer has dictatorial power over the channel. We then present an extension of the 'stochastic and asymmetric-information' ('sto-asy-i') framework proposed in Lau and Lau [Lau, A., Lau, H.-S., 2005. Some two-echelon supply-chain games: Improving from deterministic-symmetric-information to stochastic-asymmetric-information models. European Journal of Operational Research 161 (1), 203-223], coupled with the notion that a profit-maximizing dominant manufacturer may implement not only [mS] but also '[pm]' -- i.e., using a manufacturer-imposed maximum retail price. We show that this new framework resolves all the logical flaws stated above. Along the way, we also present a procedure for the dominant manufacturer to design a profit-maximizing volume-discount scheme using stochastic and asymmetric demand information. Using our sto-asy-i framework to resolve the logical flaws of the det-sym-i framework also reveals two noteworthy points: (i) the attractiveness of the perfectly legal but overlooked channel-coordination mechanism [pm]; and (ii) volume discounting as a means for the dominant manufacturer to benefit from information known only to the retailer. Author Affiliation: (a) School of Business, University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong (b) Department of Management Sciences, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong (c) College of Business, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK 74078, USA (d) Institute of Logistics and Supply Chain Management, School of Management, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, Anhui 230009, P.R. China Article History: Received 15 July 2004; Accepted 21 June 2005

Consider a basic 'price-only' supply chain interaction in which the 'players' are a manufacturer and a retailer. The manufacturer sets the wholesale price ($w/unit) of a product she supplies to a retailer, who in turn sets the retail price ($p/unit) at which he sells to the consumers. The product's demand curve is a function of p. The players select to play one of several non-cooperative games such as the manufacturer-Stackelberg game. How should the players set their prices w and p? Most existing studies assume information symmetry i.e., the cost and market parameters are known equally and perfectly to both players. In reality, the retailer's knowledge of the manufacturing cost c is often controlled by the manufacturer. This paper considers explicitly the asymmetry of knowledge in c. This approach reveals interesting and surprising deviations from earlier symmetrical-c-knowledge results. Moreover, the approach also ameliorates some of the internal inconsistencies within the symmetric-information framework. We also show how the effect of knowledge asymmetry varies with the shape of the demand curve and with the degree of relative dominance between the players. We find that under a linear demand curve a manufacturer should overstate c, which is an intuitively expected result. However, under an iso-elastic demand curve she benefits herself and the entire system by understating c, which is counter-intuitive. Also, under asymmetric c-knowledge, the simultaneous decision (or 'vertical Nash') game becomes non-viable under a linear demand curve, but the game becomes quite viable and desirable under an iso-elastic demand curve., 1. Introduction Many two-echelon supply chain models are related to the following basic 'price-only' interaction: the 'players' are a manufacturer and a retailer. The manufacturer sets the unit wholesale price [...]

The paper investigates pricing/ordering issues in a dyadic supply chain, in which a core supplier sells products through a budget-constrained retailer. The retailer faces stochastic demand and is fairness-concerned as well. If needed, the retailer can get financing support from bank by means of buyback guarantee financing (BGF) mode, which is often used in China. By introducing Nash bargaining solution as the fairness reference point, we formulate the retailer’s fairness-concerned utility function and develop a two-echelon pricing/ordering game model. We then study the combined impacts of fairness concerns and BGF on two members’ equilibrium strategies and supply chain performance. We also discuss the corresponding issues under no budget constraint, no financing service and bank financing. Our results show that: (1) two members’ equilibrium strategies are significantly influenced by the retailer’s fairness-concerned behaviour and initial budget; (2) as compared to no budget constraint, BGF can bring the whole supply chain more performance, which means that BGF can yield value-added; (3) When the retailer takes the risk of uncertain market solely, the retailer’s fairness concerns are beneficial for supply chain to improve the performance. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article analyzes cost-reducing R&D cooperation by n horizontal firms, and studies two common cooperation modes with knowledge spillovers: R&D cartels (CT) and research joint ventures (RV). These firms are allowed to freely form coalitions (or alliances) among themselves to better coordinate their R&D efforts, and then compete in the production stage. We model the endogenous alliance/coalition formation between n firms given coalition structures as a two-stage game, in which the firms in the first stage choose to cooperate in R&D, and in the second stage all firms play a Cournot game in production quantity. Our results show that the coalition structure's stability is closely affected by spillover rate and degree of R&D difficulty, number of participant firms, cooperation modes, and myopic and farsighted views. We find that the grand coalition is not always myopic stable and is farsighted stable under the CT mode with a three-firm or four-firm market, while the grand coalition is always not myopic stable but is farsighted stable under the RV mode only with a four-firm market. Moreover, we find that the conditions under which there are no myopic stable coalition structures for the RV and CT modes with regard to spillover rate and degree of R&D difficulty differ. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we study three pricing policies for a monopoly platform, such as Uber or Gett, who offers vertically differentiated services to customers via multiple types of self-scheduling providers. Ideally, the platform can employ a "dynamic pricing" policy, which pays providers wages and charges customers prices for the transactions of different services that both adjust based on prevailing demand conditions, to maximize its profit. However, since it is challenging for the platform to implement and for providers to understand this policy, the other two pricing policies are commonly adopted in practice, that is, "surge pricing" policy (adopted by Uber) which pays providers a fixed commission of its dynamic prices, and "static pricing" policy (applied by Gett) which pays providers a fixed commission of its fixed prices. By observing these phenomena, we propose to study and discuss the platform's profit performance of these three pricing strategies. We show that the surge pricing policy does not always perform well, which can explain why some on-demand platforms would implement the static pricing policy in practice. Also, although the dynamic pricing policy will significantly improve the platform's profit, we find that the profitability of the static (surge) pricing policy would approach that of the dynamic pricing policy if the platform can balance the number of different types of providers and/or reduce the commission rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]