IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/jorsoc/v62y2011i3d10.1057_jors.2010.32.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An aggregate–disaggregate intermittent demand approach (ADIDA) to forecasting: an empirical proposition and analysis

Author

Listed:
  • K Nikolopoulos

    (University of Manchester)

  • A A Syntetos

    (University of Salford)

  • J E Boylan

    (Buckinghamshire New University)

  • F Petropoulos

    (National Technical University of Athens)

  • V Assimakopoulos

    (Ministry of Economy and Finance)

Abstract

Intermittent demand patterns are characterised by infrequent demand arrivals coupled with variable demand sizes. Such patterns prevail in many industrial applications, including IT, automotive, aerospace and military. An intuitively appealing strategy to deal with such patterns from a forecasting perspective is to aggregate demand in lower-frequency ‘time buckets’ thereby reducing the presence of zero observations. However, such aggregation may result in losing useful information, as the frequency of observations is reduced. In this paper, we explore the effects of aggregation by investigating 5000 stock keeping units from the Royal Air Force (UK). We are also concerned with the empirical determination of an optimum aggregation level as well as the effects of aggregating demand in time buckets that equal the lead-time length (plus review period). This part of the analysis is of direct relevance to a (periodic) inventory management setting where such cumulative lead-time demand estimates are required. Our study allows insights to be gained into the value of aggregation in an intermittent demand context. The paper concludes with an agenda for further research.

Suggested Citation

  • K Nikolopoulos & A A Syntetos & J E Boylan & F Petropoulos & V Assimakopoulos, 2011. "An aggregate–disaggregate intermittent demand approach (ADIDA) to forecasting: an empirical proposition and analysis," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 62(3), pages 544-554, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:pal:jorsoc:v:62:y:2011:i:3:d:10.1057_jors.2010.32
    DOI: 10.1057/jors.2010.32
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/jors.2010.32
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/jors.2010.32?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

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

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. A A Syntetos & J E Boylan & J D Croston, 2005. "On the categorization of demand patterns," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 56(5), pages 495-503, May.
    2. F R Johnston & J E Boylan & E A Shale, 2003. "An examination of the size of orders from customers, their characterisation and the implications for inventory control of slow moving items," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 54(8), pages 833-837, August.
    3. Andrea Silvestrini & David Veredas, 2008. "Temporal Aggregation Of Univariate And Multivariate Time Series Models: A Survey," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(3), pages 458-497, July.
    4. Syntetos, Aris A. & Nikolopoulos, Konstantinos & Boylan, John E., 2010. "Judging the judges through accuracy-implication metrics: The case of inventory forecasting," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 134-143, January.
    5. Syntetos, Aris A. & Boylan, John E., 2005. "The accuracy of intermittent demand estimates," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 303-314.
    6. Teunter, Ruud & Sani, Babangida, 2009. "On the bias of Croston's forecasting method," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 194(1), pages 177-183, April.
    7. A A Syntetos & J E Boylan & J D Croston, 2006. "Reply to Kostenko and Hyndman," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 57(10), pages 1257-1258, October.
    8. R D Snyder & A B Koehler & J K Ord, 1999. "Lead time demand for simple exponential smoothing: an adjustment factor for the standard deviation," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 50(10), pages 1079-1082, October.
    9. Henghsiu Tsai & K. S. Chan, 2005. "Temporal Aggregation of Stationary And Nonstationary Discrete‐Time Processes," Journal of Time Series Analysis, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(4), pages 613-624, July.
    10. Porras, Eric & Dekker, Rommert, 2008. "An inventory control system for spare parts at a refinery: An empirical comparison of different re-order point methods," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 184(1), pages 101-132, January.
    11. Willemain, Thomas R. & Smart, Charles N. & Shockor, Joseph H. & DeSautels, Philip A., 1994. "Forecasting intermittent demand in manufacturing: a comparative evaluation of Croston's method," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 529-538, December.
    12. Snyder, Ralph, 2002. "Forecasting sales of slow and fast moving inventories," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 140(3), pages 684-699, August.
    13. Assimakopoulos, V. & Nikolopoulos, K., 2000. "The theta model: a decomposition approach to forecasting," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 521-530.
    14. Syntetos, A. A. & Boylan, J. E., 2001. "On the bias of intermittent demand estimates," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1-3), pages 457-466, May.
    15. Hyndman, Rob J. & Koehler, Anne B., 2006. "Another look at measures of forecast accuracy," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 679-688.
    16. Willemain, Thomas R. & Smart, Charles N. & Schwarz, Henry F., 2004. "A new approach to forecasting intermittent demand for service parts inventories," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 375-387.
    17. Syntetos, Aris A. & Boylan, John E., 2006. "On the stock control performance of intermittent demand estimators," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(1), pages 36-47, September.
    18. A A Syntetos & M Z Babai & Y Dallery & R Teunter, 2009. "Periodic control of intermittent demand items: theory and empirical analysis," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 60(5), pages 611-618, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Pennings, Clint L.P. & van Dalen, Jan & van der Laan, Erwin A., 2017. "Exploiting elapsed time for managing intermittent demand for spare parts," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 258(3), pages 958-969.
    2. Pinçe, Çerağ & Turrini, Laura & Meissner, Joern, 2021. "Intermittent demand forecasting for spare parts: A Critical review," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 105(C).
    3. Teunter, Ruud H. & Syntetos, Aris A. & Zied Babai, M., 2011. "Intermittent demand: Linking forecasting to inventory obsolescence," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 214(3), pages 606-615, November.
    4. Pierre Dodin & Jingyi Xiao & Yossiri Adulyasak & Neda Etebari Alamdari & Lea Gauthier & Philippe Grangier & Paul Lemaitre & William L. Hamilton, 2023. "Bombardier Aftermarket Demand Forecast with Machine Learning," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 53(6), pages 425-445, November.
    5. Syntetos, Aris A. & Zied Babai, M. & Gardner, Everette S., 2015. "Forecasting intermittent inventory demands: simple parametric methods vs. bootstrapping," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(8), pages 1746-1752.
    6. Kourentzes, Nikolaos, 2013. "Intermittent demand forecasts with neural networks," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(1), pages 198-206.
    7. Kourentzes, Nikolaos, 2014. "On intermittent demand model optimisation and selection," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 180-190.
    8. Bacchetti, Andrea & Saccani, Nicola, 2012. "Spare parts classification and demand forecasting for stock control: Investigating the gap between research and practice," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 722-737.
    9. Snyder, Ralph D. & Ord, J. Keith & Beaumont, Adrian, 2012. "Forecasting the intermittent demand for slow-moving inventories: A modelling approach," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 485-496.
    10. Zhu, Sha & Dekker, Rommert & van Jaarsveld, Willem & Renjie, Rex Wang & Koning, Alex J., 2017. "An improved method for forecasting spare parts demand using extreme value theory," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 261(1), pages 169-181.
    11. Altay, Nezih & Litteral, Lewis A. & Rudisill, Frank, 2012. "Effects of correlation on intermittent demand forecasting and stock control," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 275-283.
    12. Hu, Qiwei & Boylan, John E. & Chen, Huijing & Labib, Ashraf, 2018. "OR in spare parts management: A review," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 266(2), pages 395-414.
    13. Altay, Nezih & Rudisill, Frank & Litteral, Lewis A., 2008. "Adapting Wright's modification of Holt's method to forecasting intermittent demand," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(2), pages 389-408, February.
    14. Li, Chongshou & Lim, Andrew, 2018. "A greedy aggregation–decomposition method for intermittent demand forecasting in fashion retailing," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 269(3), pages 860-869.
    15. Gardner, Everette Jr., 2006. "Exponential smoothing: The state of the art--Part II," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 637-666.
    16. Babai, M.Z. & Dallery, Y. & Boubaker, S. & Kalai, R., 2019. "A new method to forecast intermittent demand in the presence of inventory obsolescence," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 209(C), pages 30-41.
    17. Boylan, J.E. & Syntetos, A.A., 2007. "The accuracy of a Modified Croston procedure," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(2), pages 511-517, June.
    18. Jože Martin Rožanec & Blaž Fortuna & Dunja Mladenić, 2022. "Reframing Demand Forecasting: A Two-Fold Approach for Lumpy and Intermittent Demand," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-21, July.
    19. Turrini, Laura & Meissner, Joern, 2019. "Spare parts inventory management: New evidence from distribution fitting," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 273(1), pages 118-130.
    20. Petropoulos, Fotios & Apiletti, Daniele & Assimakopoulos, Vassilios & Babai, Mohamed Zied & Barrow, Devon K. & Ben Taieb, Souhaib & Bergmeir, Christoph & Bessa, Ricardo J. & Bijak, Jakub & Boylan, Joh, 2022. "Forecasting: theory and practice," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 705-871.
      • Fotios Petropoulos & Daniele Apiletti & Vassilios Assimakopoulos & Mohamed Zied Babai & Devon K. Barrow & Souhaib Ben Taieb & Christoph Bergmeir & Ricardo J. Bessa & Jakub Bijak & John E. Boylan & Jet, 2020. "Forecasting: theory and practice," Papers 2012.03854, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.

    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:pal:jorsoc:v:62:y:2011:i:3:d:10.1057_jors.2010.32. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.palgrave-journals.com/ .

    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.