To meet consumer replacement needs, the free replacement extended warranty (FREW) is born and becomes popular in the extended warranty (EW) market. In this context, firms need to consider whether to introduce the FREW. Given the limited resources of the firms and cannibalism caused by the FREW, firms need to decide how to introduce the FREW. To address these issues, we construct theoretical models and obtain some managerial insights. We find that the optimal introduction strategy is related to the development cost and the expansion effect on the product market. Moreover, the optimal bundling strategy is affected by the unit maintenance cost and the cost discount caused by the FREW. Only when the benefit of the FREW is great enough, is bundling always better. An interesting result is that the price of the bundled EW is higher than the sum of the EWs’ prices when selling EWs separately.

The management of recycling and remanufacturing supply chains, which can help enterprises achieve low pollution, low energy consumption and sustainable development, has become a new strategy of modern enterprises. The factors of supply chain and government mechanisms will have an impact on enterprise decisions for recycling, remanufacturing and social welfare. In order to promote the sustainable operation of the supply chain, considering the coordination role of government mechanisms and supply chain, a recycling and remanufacturing supply chain model composed of a manufacturer, retailer and recycler is constructed. This paper discusses the pricing decision of new/remanufactured products, supply chain performance level, such as remanufacturing effort, publicity service efforts and profit, and social welfare in five models of three situations: centralized situation, including non-government mechanisms and non-supply chain coordination; manufacturer-led situation, including non-government mechanisms and non-supply chain coordination, government mechanisms and non-supply chain coordination, government mechanisms and supply chain coordination; government-led situation, including government mechanisms and non-supply chain coordination. It is found that under manufacturer-led situations, the government subsidy and bonus-penalty mechanisms can encourage manufacturer and retailer to actively participate in the recycling and remanufacturing activities. The supply chain coordination contract can further enhance the role of the consumer market and promote the implementation of government mechanisms. Manufacturer adopts a cost-sharing contract to encourage recyclers to carry out recycling activities. Under certain conditions, the contract can effectively improve the benefits and social welfare. The research conclusions have important theoretical and practical application value for the coordination and cooperation among enterprises in the supply chain and the formulation of government mechanisms.

The growing popularity of aggregation platforms has attracted widespread attention in the ride-hailing market in recent years. In order to obtain additional orders by charging commissions and slotting fees, many ride-hailing platforms choose to bundle with aggregation platforms. Unlike traditional reseller electronic channels, the bundle channels may affect pricing of platforms, service levels of drivers, market demands and they may further impact on profits. These different attitudes raise an interesting and key question about the influence of bundle channels in ride-hailing platforms. In this paper, we propose an analytical framework for pricing strategies of ride-hailing and aggregation platforms under bundle mode and analyze their pricing process from the perspective of Nash and Stackelberg games, where the platforms serve as leaders to determine optimal prices through Nash equilibrium and the drivers serve as followers to provide optimal service levels. Through sensitivity analysis of service levels and costs, we capture the distribution trends of profits between the platforms. Based on some numerical examples and results analysis, some interesting managerial insights on pricing of ride-hailing and aggregation platforms are gained.

Losses experienced by the Indonesian government due to floods are predicted. It is because of the significance of population growth, closure of water catchment areas, and climate change in many regions in Indonesia. The government has tried to reduce the risk but faces insufficient funds. Therefore, new innovative funding sources are essential to overcome these limitations. One way to obtain it is through issuing Flood Catastrophe Bonds (FCB). Unfortunately, Indonesia has had no FCB price estimate until now. On the basis of this problem, this study aims to estimate the FCB price in Indonesia. The primary method used is the approximation method of the aggregate loss distribution. This method can compute the aggregate flood loss cumulative distribution function value faster. The FCB fair price estimation results are cheap because the risk of the instrument is significant. This significant risk is also proportional to the large return. Finally, further analysis shows that in Indonesia, the attachment point of the FCB has a relationship that is in line with the price, while the term of FCB does not. This research is expected to assist the Indonesian government in determining the fair price of FCB in Indonesia. This research can assist the investors in choosing FCB based on expected return, attachment point, and the term they want.

Decision making in supply chains is influenced by demand variations, and hence sales, purchase orders and inventory levels are therefore concerned. This paper presents a non-linear optimization model for a two-echelon supply chain, for a unique product. In addition, the model includes the consumers’ maximum willingness to pay, taking socioeconomic differences into account. To do so, the constrained multinomial logit for discrete choices is used to estimate demand levels. Then, a metaheuristic approach based on particle swarm optimization is proposed to determine the optimal product sales price and inventory coordination variables. To validate the proposed model, a supply chain of a technological product was chosen and three scenarios are analyzed: discounts, demand segmentation and demand overestimation. Results are analyzed on the basis of profits, lotsizing and inventory turnover and market share. It can be concluded that the maximum willingness to pay must be taken into consideration, otherwise fictitious profits may mislead decision making, and although the market share would seem to improve, overall profits are not in fact necessarily better.

Social networks can provide sellers across the world with invaluable information about the structure of possible influences among different members of a network, whether positive or negative, and can be used to maximize diffusion in the network. Here, a novel mathematical monopoly product pricing model is introduced for maximization of market share in noncompetitive environment. In the proposed model, a customer’s decision to buy a product is not only based on the price, quality and need time for the product but also on the positive and negative influences of his/her neighbors. Therefore, customers are considered heterogeneous and a referral bonus is granted to every customer whose neighbors also buy the product. Here, the degree of influence is directly related to the intensity of the customers’ relationships. Finally, using the proposed model for a real case study, the optimal policy for product sales that is the ratio of product sale price in comparison with its cost and also the optimal amounts of referral bonus per customer is achieved.

This paper deals with a pricing and production-distribution model for a deteriorating item in a two-echelon supply chain. The profit function for the manufacturer and retailer in the integrated supply chain is derived. The manufacturer's production batch size is regulated to an integer multiple of the discrete delivery lot quantity to the retailer. The objective is to maximize the total profit per unit time by finding the optimal selling price, production lot size, total cycle time, number of deliveries, and delivery lot size, simultaneously. Based on the notion of optimal interval, we outline an effective algorithm for finding the optimal solution. Finally, the authors present a numerical example to illustrate the theoretical results of the model. Sensitivity analysis for the optimal solution with respect to major parameters is also carried out. The results show that, when the deterioration rate increases, both the optimal production lot size and cycle time decrease. It is interesting to note that an increase in the deterioration rate also tends to reduce the delivery lot size without affecting the number of deliveries per production batch. Also, the optimal interval for N does not change when deterioration rate changes. Reductions in the inventory cycle times for both parties demonstrate the negative effects of deterioration on the supply chain.

Leasing currently plays an important role for the global economy. The equipment leasing earning acquired through leasing rather than cash or credit, has reached a dominant level. With this regards, this paper represents a basic mixed-integer non-linear programming model. The study deliberates a firm that leases new products and remanufactured leased merchandises. The proposed study considers the end of lease contract, which contains several options: Return the leased product, return the used product and purchase other remanufactured product and buying the leased product. The primary objective is to maximize the discrepancy between the revenue and the costs of a firm, which leases new products as well as selling remanufactured ones. The product deteriorates with time and the difference between a new and used good is obvious. The product must undergo a remanufacturing procedure before being sold as a remanufactured product.

This paper optimizes joint mixed bundling, assortment planning and pricing problems for complementary retail categories that comprise substitutable items. These categories are divided into one primary category and multiple secondary categories and based on cross-selling effect, customers of primary category can opt to buy from other categories. It is assumed that the bundle can comprise one product of each offered complementary categories. A mixed-integer nonlinear programming is proposed that maximizes total profit by optimizing strategy of bundling, assortment selection and prices of single products and the bundle under a maximum-surplus customer choice model. Then because of computational considerations, this model is linearized and converted to a mixed-integer linear programming; whereby exact solution for even large-scale problems can be obtained. The results show that if cross-selling effect between product categories is overlooked or bundling of products is not allowed, then significant profit losses, will be resulted. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study on bundling strategies in assortment selection decisions.

Co-op advertising is an interactive relationship between manufacturer and retailer(s) supply chain and makes up the majority of marketing budget in many product lines for manufacturers and retailers. This paper considers pricing and co-op advertising decisions in two-stage supply chain and develops a monopolistic retailer and duopolistic retailer & apos; s model. In these models, the manufacturer and the retailers play the Nash, Manufacturer-Stackelberg and cooperative game to make optimal pricing and co-op advertising decisions. A bargaining model is utilized for determine the best pricing and co-op advertising scheme for achieving full coordination in the supply chain.