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The article addresses the optimization of safety stock service levels for parts in a repair kit. The work was undertaken to assist a public transit entity that stores thousands of parts used to repair equipment acquired over many decades. Demand is intermittent, procurement lead times are long, and the total inventory investment is significant.

Demand exists for repair kits, and a repair cannot start until all required parts are available. The cost model includes holding cost to carry the part being modeled as well as shortage cost that consists of the holding cost to carry all other repair kit parts for the duration of the part’s lead time. The model combines deterministic and stochastic approaches by assuming a fixed ordering cycle with Poisson demand.

The results show that optimal service levels vary as a function of repair demand rate, part lead time, and cost of the part as a percentage of the total part cost for the repair kit. Optimal service levels are higher for inexpensive parts and lower for expensive parts, although the precise levels are impacted by repair demand and part lead time.

The proposed model can impact society by improving the operational performance and efficiency of public transit systems, by ensuring that home repair technicians will be prepared for repair tasks, and by reducing the environmental impact of electronic waste consistent with the right-to-repair movement.

The optimization model is unique because (1) it quantifies shortage cost as the cost of unnecessary holding other parts in the repair kit during the shortage time, and (2) it determines a unique service level for each part in a repair kit bases on its lead time, its unit cost, and the total cost of all parts in the repair kit. Results will be counter-intuitive for many inventory managers who would assume that more critical parts should have higher service levels.

This research aims to empirically investigate the impacts of product and international diversification strategies on firm-level inventory performance.

This study empirically examines the associations between product and international diversification strategies and inventory performance based on a sample of 64,124 observations across 7,367 US publicly traded firms between 1989 and 2019 from the COMPUSTAT Segment, Fundamental Annual and Fundamental Quarterly data files. We employ both linear and nonlinear regression models to perform our empirical analysis.

This research provides strong evidence that there exists a U-shaped relationship between unrelated product diversification and inventory level and a partially inverted U-shaped relationship between international diversification and inventory level. We also find a positive impact of related product diversification on inventory level, but there is no significant curvilinear relationship between related product diversification and inventory level.

Our research findings offer important insights into top management’s strategic planning for diversification strategies and operations manager’s inventory control policies to achieve the strategic fit between corporate diversification and inventory management.

Product and international diversification strategies not only play an essential role in the firm’s competitive advantage, but also have a significant influence on operations manager’s inventory decision. This research is among the first to systematically investigate how top management’s related product, unrelated product and international diversification strategies may have complex nonlinear impacts on inventory performance.

The primary objective of this article is to examine current procurement, inventory control and management practices in modern healthcare, with a particular focus on the procurement and management of surgical supplies in a prominent public, highly specialized healthcare sector.

This study was conducted in three phases. In Phase 1, the study team interacted with various hospital management stakeholders, including the surgical hospital store, examined the current procurement process and identified challenges. Phase 2 focused on selecting items for a detailed study and collected the qualitative and quantitative details of the store department of the healthcare sector chosen. A detailed study analyzed revenue, output/demand, inventory levels, etc. In Phase 3, a decision-making framework is proposed, and inventory control systems are redesigned and demonstrated for the selected items.

It was observed that the demand for many surgical items had increased significantly over the years due to an increase in disposable/disposable items, while inventories fluctuated widely. Maximum inventory levels varied between 50 and 75%. Storage and availability were important issues for the hospital. It is assumed the hospital adopts the proposed inventory control system. In this case, the benefits can be a saving of 62% of the maximum inventory, 20% of the average stock in the system and optimal use of storage space, improving the performance and productivity of the hospital.

This study can help the healthcare sector administration to develop better systems for the procurement and delivery of common surgical items and efficient resource allocation. It can help provide adequate training to store staff. This study can help improve management/procurement policies, ordering and delivery systems, better service levels, and inventory control of items in the hospital business context. This study can serve as a pilot study to further investigate the overall hospital operations.

This study can help the healthcare sector administration develop better systems for procuring and delivering common surgical items and efficient resource allocation. It can help provide adequate training to store staff. This study can help improve management/procurement policies, ordering and delivery systems, better service levels and inventory control of items in the hospital business context. This study can serve as a pilot study to further investigate the overall hospital operations.

This study is an early attempt to develop a decision framework and inventory control system from the perspective of healthcare inventory management. The gaps identified in real hospital scenarios are investigated, and theoretically based-inventory management strategies are applied and proposed.

Effective inventory management is crucial for SMEs due to limited resources and higher risks like cash flow, storage space, and stockouts. Hence, the aim is to explore how technology and know-how can be integrated with inventory practices and impact operational performance.

The basis of the analysis was collecting papers from a wide range of databases, which included Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. In the first phase of the process, a search string with as many as nine related keywords was used to obtain 175 papers. It further filtered them based on their titles and abstracts to retain 95 papers that were included for thorough analysis.

The study introduced innovative methods of measuring inventory practices by exploring the impact of know-how. It is the first of its kind to identify and demonstrate how technical, technological, and behavioral know-how can influence inventory management practices and ultimately impact the performance of emerging SMEs. This study stands out for its comprehensive approach, which covers traditional and modern inventory management technologies in a single study.

The study provides valuable insights into the interplay between technical, technological, and behavioral know-how in inventory management practices and their effects on the performance of emerging SMEs in Industry 5.0 in the light of RBV theory.

The RBV theory and the Industry 5.0 paradigm are used in this study to explore how developing SMEs' inventory management practices influence their performance. This study investigates the effects of traditional and modern inventory management systems on business performance. Incorporating RBV theory with the Industry 5.0 framework investigates firm-specific resources and technological advances in the current industrial revolution. This unique technique advances the literature on inventory management and has industry implications.

Efforts to implement supplier selection and order allocation (SSOA) approaches in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are quite restricted due to the lack of affordable and simple-to-use strategies. Although there is a huge amount of literature on SSOA techniques, very few studies have attempted to address the issues faced by SMEs and develop strategies from their point of view. The purpose of this study is to provide an effective, practical, and time-tested integrated SSOA framework for evaluating the performance of suppliers and allocating orders to them that can improve the efficiency and competitiveness of SMEs.

This study was conducted in two stages. First, an integrated supplier selection approach was designed, which consists of the analytic hierarchy process and newly developed measurement alternatives and ranking using compromise solution to evaluate supplier performance and rank them. Second, the Wagner-Whitin algorithm is used to determine optimal order quantities and optimize inventory carrying and ordering costs. The joint impact of quantity discounts is also evaluated at the end.

Insights derived from the case study proved that the proposed approach is capable of assisting purchase managers in the SSOA decision-making process. In addition, this case study resulted in 10.89% total cost savings and fewer stock-out situations.

Criteria selected in this study are based on the advice of the managers in the selected manufacturing organizations. So the methods applied are limited to manufacturing SMEs. There were some aspects of the supplier selection process that this study could not explore. The development of an effective, reliable supplier selection procedure is a continuous process and it is indeed certainly possible that there are other aspects of supplier selection that are more crucial but are not considered in the proposed approach.

Purchase managers working in SMEs will be the primary beneficiaries of the developed approach. The suggested integrated approach can make a strategic difference in the working of SMEs.

A practical SSOA framework is developed for professionals working in SMEs. This approach will help SMEs to manage their operations effectively.

This paper aims to examine how interfirm transactional and relational assets drive firm performance (FP) in digitally integrated supply chains.

The authors combine the Transaction Cost Economics (TCE) and Relational Exchange Theory (RET) frameworks to hypothesize that FP will be a function of Asset Specificity (AS), Digital Technology Usage (DTU) and Collaborative Information Sharing (CIS). In addition, the authors hypothesize that Supply Chain Integration (SCI) will partially mediate the effect of DTU and fully mediate the impact of AS and CIS on FP. A cross-sectional survey of supply chain managers is used to test the hypotheses.

Findings indicate that specific investments in digitally integrated supply chains would increase FP. In addition, SCI fully mediates the relationships between AS and FP and CIS and FP, while SCI partially mediates the influence of DTU on FP.

Managers could strategically engage in the technologies that effectively fit within the firm’s supply chain strategies and seek to develop a pragmatic expertise that enables the effective use of technology in a comprehensive setting.

The study enriches the extant literature by incorporating TCE and RET as contradictory viewpoints on AS and investigating how transactional and relational assets affect FP in digitally integrated supply chains.

This study aims to investigate the role of international price volatility and inventories on domestic market price dynamics in the case of agricultural commodities.

A structural model is employed to uncover relationships among commodity price, price volatility, inventories and convenience yield. Monthly producer price data along with annual data on trade, consumption, inventories and tariffs for 71 countries and 13 commodities covering 2010–2019 are assembled to estimate the model. With a first-stage Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO) estimator to identify the best instrument set, a nonlinear approach is used to estimate the model.

Results show that international market information plays a critical role in domestic market price dynamics. International price volatility has a stronger effect on domestic prices than that of international inventories.

Current upheaval in commodity markets requires an understanding of how prices move together and inventories affect that movement. A country's internal price is not independent of the effects of global market events.

Although hypotheses exist that global market information (volatility and inventories) helps countries manage domestic commodity prices, there have been limited studies on this relationship, especially with a structured model and cross-country data.

This study explores the intricate relationship between inventory leanness, financial constraints and digital transformation in listed Chinese manufacturing firms.

Using a large panel data collected from 2,563 Chinese listed manufacturing enterprises over the period from 2012 to 2021, this research employs the instrumental variable method combined with two-stage least squares estimators to explore the U- shaped relationship between inventory leanness and financial constraints. Furthermore, the moderating role of digital transformation is demonstrated.

Contrary to traditional assumptions, our research uncovers a U-shaped relationship between inventory leanness and financial constraints, indicating that excessive inventory reduction can exacerbate financial constraints. Digital transformation plays a significant moderating role, particularly in highly digitalized environments.

Our findings have practical significance for top managers and policymakers. We advocate for a balanced approach to lean inventory management to mitigating financial constraints. The study emphasizes the pivotal role of digital transformation in alleviating the impact of inventory leanness on financial constraints, highlighting the need for digital transformation strategies.

This research provides a comprehensive analysis of inventory leanness, financial constraints and digital transformation dynamics. It challenges conventional thinking by revealing the nonlinear nature of the inventory leanness–financial constraints relationship. The concept of moderation highlights the moderating effect of digital transformation. This study offers practical guidance for practitioners and policymakers.

The purpose of this research is to examine Micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs). Which have limited access to financial resources from financial intermediaries. Thus, resource allocation is a primary concern for them.

This research studies the determinants of cash conversion cycle components and cash flow of MSMEs operating in Ecuador. This study examined a robust sample of 19,680 firms from 2000 to 2020, using the two-step generalized methods of moments to control for endogeneity and multicollinearity of independent variables issues.

The sample was divided into working capital intensive and fixed capital intensive firms. It was found that in every segment (micro-, small- and medium-sized), the majority of firms are working capital intensive and their average return is higher. This implies that small business owners assign the majority of their resources to current assets, which thus far have enabled them to achieve higher profitability.

Research investigated Ecuadorian MSMEs in a dollarized developing environment. Scrutinizing working capital intensive vs fixed capital intensive.

This paper aims to present the vertical integration state-of-the-art and propose an expansion of the operations and supply chain management (OSCM) field by identifying gaps and bottlenecks.

This paper uses a systematic literature review based on a sample of 173 OSCM field articles, collected from Scopus and Web of Science databases.

There are no single factors, such as future costs, structures or skills development, in the decision to vertically integrate operations. It is necessary to combine the vision of production costs with the perspective of governance and transaction costs. In addition, it is essential to consider the competency perspective and its impact on capability building.

Few studies have attempted to understand how vertical integration is used in terms of OSCM research themes and theories. Vertical integration can help companies face challenges and serve as a potential solution for achieving better prices, demand control and quality management.

The significant role of vertical integration mechanisms in supply chains is crucial for managers evaluating a firm's reconfiguration with more vertical operations. Policymakers interested in supporting the smoothness of vertical integration decisions in regulatory agencies play a key role as contingencies.

In times of global challenges, vertical integration is a strategy known to be more effective for firms to obtain a competitive advantage, making them more resilient.

This paper addresses gaps in the vertical integration theme and provides insights for future research development.