IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jetheo/v101y2001i1p281-300.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Optimal Inventory Policies when the Demand Distribution Is Not Known

Author

Listed:
  • Larson, C. Erik
  • Olson, Lars J.
  • Sharma, Sunil

Abstract

This paper analyzes the stochastic inventory control problem when the demand distribution is not known. In contrast to previous Bayesian inventory models, this paper adopts a non-parametric Bayesian approach in which the firm’s prior information is characterized by a Dirichlet process prior. This provides considerable freedom in the specification of prior information about demand and it permits the accommodation of fixed order costs. As information on the demand distribution accumulates, optimal history-dependent (s,S) rules are shown to converge to an (s,S) rule that is optimal when the underlying demand distribution is known.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Larson, C. Erik & Olson, Lars J. & Sharma, Sunil, 2001. "Optimal Inventory Policies when the Demand Distribution Is Not Known," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 101(1), pages 281-300, November.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:jetheo:v:101:y:2001:i:1:p:281-300
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022-0531(00)92772-8
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rothschild, Michael, 1974. "Searching for the Lowest Price When the Distribution of Prices Is Unknown," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(4), pages 689-711, July/Aug..
    2. Samuel Karlin, 1960. "Dynamic Inventory Policy with Varying Stochastic Demands," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 6(3), pages 231-258, April.
    3. William S. Lovejoy, 1990. "Myopic Policies for Some Inventory Models with Uncertain Demand Distributions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 36(6), pages 724-738, June.
    4. Katy S. Azoury, 1985. "Bayes Solution to Dynamic Inventory Models Under Unknown Demand Distribution," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(9), pages 1150-1160, September.
    5. Bikhchandani, Sushil & Sharma, Sunil, 1996. "Optimal search with learning," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 20(1-3), pages 333-359.
    6. Dutta, Prajit K. & Majumdar, Mukul K. & Sundaram, Rangarajan K., 1994. "Parametric continuity in dynamic programming problems," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 18(6), pages 1069-1092, November.
    7. Katy S. Azoury & Bruce L. Miller, 1984. "A Comparison of the Optimal Ordering Levels of Bayesian and Non-Bayesian Inventory Models," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(8), pages 993-1003, August.
    8. Michael Rothschild, 1974. "Searching for the Lowest Price When the Distribution of Prices Is Unknown: A Summary," NBER Chapters, in: Annals of Economic and Social Measurement, Volume 3, number 1, pages 293-294, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Donald L. Iglehart, 1964. "The Dynamic Inventory Problem with Unknown Demand Distribution," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 10(3), pages 429-440, April.
    10. William S. Lovejoy, 1993. "Suboptimal Policies, with Bounds, for Parameter Adaptive Decision Processes," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 41(3), pages 583-599, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Janssen, E. & Strijbosch, L.W.G. & Brekelmans, R.C.M., 2006. "Assessing the Effects of using Demand Parameters Estimates in Inventory Control," Other publications TiSEM e61834bf-8202-4a25-9311-f, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    2. Janssen, Elleke & Strijbosch, Leo & Brekelmans, Ruud, 2009. "Assessing the effects of using demand parameters estimates in inventory control and improving the performance using a correction function," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(1), pages 34-42, March.
    3. Mor Armony & Erica L. Plambeck, 2005. "The Impact of Duplicate Orders on Demand Estimation and Capacity Investment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(10), pages 1505-1518, October.
    4. Sandun C. Perera & Suresh P. Sethi, 2023. "A survey of stochastic inventory models with fixed costs: Optimality of (s, S) and (s, S)‐type policies—Discrete‐time case," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 32(1), pages 131-153, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Glenn, David & Bisi, Arnab & Puterman, Martin L., 2004. "The Bayesian Newsvendors in Supply Chains with Unobserved Lost Sales," Working Papers 04-0110, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Business.
    2. Xiaomei Ding & Martin L. Puterman & Arnab Bisi, 2002. "The Censored Newsvendor and the Optimal Acquisition of Information," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 50(3), pages 517-527, June.
    3. Katy S. Azoury & Julia Miyaoka, 2009. "Optimal Policies and Approximations for a Bayesian Linear Regression Inventory Model," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(5), pages 813-826, May.
    4. Arnab Bisi & Maqbool Dada, 2007. "Dynamic learning, pricing, and ordering by a censored newsvendor," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(4), pages 448-461, June.
    5. Woonghee Tim Huh & Paat Rusmevichientong, 2009. "A Nonparametric Asymptotic Analysis of Inventory Planning with Censored Demand," Mathematics of Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 34(1), pages 103-123, February.
    6. Yossi Aviv, 2003. "A Time-Series Framework for Supply-Chain Inventory Management," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 51(2), pages 210-227, April.
    7. Yossi Aviv & Awi Federgruen, 2001. "Design for Postponement: A Comprehensive Characterization of Its Benefits Under Unknown Demand Distributions," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 49(4), pages 578-598, August.
    8. Ghate, Archis, 2015. "Optimal minimum bids and inventory scrapping in sequential, single-unit, Vickrey auctions with demand learning," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 245(2), pages 555-570.
    9. Joseph M. Milner & Panos Kouvelis, 2005. "Order Quantity and Timing Flexibility in Supply Chains: The Role of Demand Characteristics," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(6), pages 970-985, June.
    10. Harun Avci & Kagan Gokbayrak & Emre Nadar, 2020. "Structural Results for Average‐Cost Inventory Models with Markov‐Modulated Demand and Partial Information," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 29(1), pages 156-173, January.
    11. Ananth V. Iyer & Vinayak Deshpande & Zhengping Wu, 2003. "A Postponement Model for Demand Management," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(8), pages 983-1002, August.
    12. James T. Treharne & Charles R. Sox, 2002. "Adaptive Inventory Control for Nonstationary Demand and Partial Information," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 48(5), pages 607-624, May.
    13. Joseph M. Milner & Panos Kouvelis, 2002. "On the Complementary Value of Accurate Demand Information and Production and Supplier Flexibility," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 4(2), pages 99-113, December.
    14. Prak, Dennis & Teunter, Ruud & Syntetos, Aris, 2017. "On the calculation of safety stocks when demand is forecasted," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 256(2), pages 454-461.
    15. Amelie F. Constant & Annabelle Krause & Ulf Rinne & Klaus F. Zimmermann, 2017. "Reservation wages of first- and second-generation migrants," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(13), pages 945-949, July.
    16. Choi, Tsan-Ming, 2007. "Pre-season stocking and pricing decisions for fashion retailers with multiple information updating," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(1), pages 146-170, March.
    17. Gershkov, Alex & Moldovanu, Benny, 2013. "Non-Bayesian optimal search and dynamic implementation," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 118(1), pages 121-125.
    18. Sen, Alper & Zhang, Alex X., 2009. "Style goods pricing with demand learning," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 196(3), pages 1058-1075, August.
    19. Rafael P. Greminger, 2022. "Optimal Search and Discovery," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(5), pages 3904-3924, May.
    20. Andreas I. Mueller & Johannes Spinnewijn & Giorgio Topa, 2021. "Job Seekers' Perceptions and Employment Prospects: Heterogeneity, Duration Dependence, and Bias," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(1), pages 324-363, January.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jetheo:v:101:y:2001:i:1:p:281-300. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622869 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.