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Competitive analysis of the online inventory problem

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  • Larsen, Kim S.
  • Wøhlk, Sanne

Abstract

We consider a real-time version of the inventory problem with deterministic demand in which decisions as to when to replenish and how much to buy must be made in an online fashion without knowledge of future prices. We suggest online algorithms for each of four models for the problem and use competitive analysis to obtain algorithmic upper and lower bounds on the worst-case performance of the algorithms compared to an optimal offline algorithm. These bounds are closely related to the tight -bound obtained for the simplest of the models, where M and m are the upper and lower bounds on the price fluctuation.

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  • Larsen, Kim S. & Wøhlk, Sanne, 2010. "Competitive analysis of the online inventory problem," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 207(2), pages 685-696, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:ejores:v:207:y:2010:i:2:p:685-696
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    Cited by:

    1. Wenqiang Dai & Meng Zheng & Xu Chen & Zhuolin Yang, 0. "Online economic ordering problem for deteriorating items with limited price information," Journal of Combinatorial Optimization, Springer, vol. 0, pages 1-23.
    2. Guanqun Ni, 2023. "An improved online replenishment policy and its competitive ratio analysis for a purchase-to-order seller," Journal of Combinatorial Optimization, Springer, vol. 46(2), pages 1-14, September.
    3. Wang, Wei & Lan, Yingjie, 2022. "Robust one-way trading with limited number of transactions and heuristics for fixed transaction costs," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 247(C).
    4. Wang, Liying & Lan, Yingjie & Zhang, Jean X., 2016. "Competitive difference analysis of the one-way trading problem with limited informationAuthor-Name: Wang, Wei," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 252(3), pages 879-887.
    5. Dai, Wenqiang & Dong, Yucheng & Zhang, Xiaotian, 2016. "Competitive analysis of the online financial lease problem," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 250(3), pages 865-873.
    6. Wenqiang Dai & Meng Zheng & Xu Chen & Zhuolin Yang, 2022. "Online economic ordering problem for deteriorating items with limited price information," Journal of Combinatorial Optimization, Springer, vol. 44(4), pages 2246-2268, November.
    7. Dai, Wenqiang & Jiang, Qingzhu & Feng, Yi, 2016. "A note: An improved upper bound for the online inventory problem with bounded storage and order costs," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 249(2), pages 628-630.
    8. Mohr, Esther, 2017. "Optimal replenishment under price uncertainty," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 258(1), pages 136-143.

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