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Smart Technologies and Port Operations: Optimal Adoption Strategy with Network Externality Consideration
... In this context, a new concept called smart port is emerging, and it is considered a solution that addresses the new challenges faced by the international trade and logistics system. Smart ports are key to improving overall port performance [4], [5], [6]. The maritime industry has long service cycles, complex structures, and heterogeneous information from a growing number of stakeholders, so Port operations are often inefficient such as delivery times, long transactions, delays, poor service, and unnecessary costs due to paperwork, information sharing between stakeholders, and lack of transparency and efficiency in Port operations, this requires the availability of reliable data [5]. ...
... Smart ports are key to improving overall port performance [4], [5], [6]. The maritime industry has long service cycles, complex structures, and heterogeneous information from a growing number of stakeholders, so Port operations are often inefficient such as delivery times, long transactions, delays, poor service, and unnecessary costs due to paperwork, information sharing between stakeholders, and lack of transparency and efficiency in Port operations, this requires the availability of reliable data [5]. The accelerating demand for services means that the entire port ecosystem -from ports to inland intermodal terminals -is under pressure to modernize [7]. ...
... Ports have digitized systems for information exchange between various agents involved in the supply chain [12]. The Soekarno-Hatta Port's use of the Inaportnet system, a smart technology that simplifies information exchange between stakeholders, can improve operational efficiency at seaports [5]. However, despite using the Inaportnet system, Soekarno-Hatta Port often experiences delays in handling ship documents due to system or resource constraints. ...
... La transformación busca aprovechar las tecnologías avanzadas para optimizar operaciones portuarias, reducir costos y minimizar impactos ambientales [7]. ...
... La inteligencia artificial (IA) en la industria marítima se ha convertido en una tendencia significativa debido a su capacidad para mejorar la eficiencia y la precisión de diversas operaciones [7]. ...
... Consequently, ref. [28] implemented an innovative hybrid assessment methodology to evaluate the performance of six Chinese ports, considering a wide range of factors, including service quality, technology, sustainability, clustering, hub functionalities, and governance and policy considerations. Ref. [29] created a game theory model to determine the most effective strategy for adopting smart technologies in ports and examined the impact of network externalities on port pricing and adoption decisions. ...
Ports are the main arteries of global trade, handling goods circulation and serving as hubs for information, capital, and technology. Integrating digital technology has become the key for green port development to achieve resource efficiency and ecological balance. The current literature overlooks how digital technology can facilitate greener port operations. This study integrates sustainable supply chain management and system dynamics theories based on an in-depth analysis of existing research results and expert interviews. The analysis focuses on three key dimensions: integrating digital technologies with infrastructure, optimizing digital management and operations, and improving environmental and safety management in a digitally driven setting. Using the fuzzy Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (Fuzzy Dematel) methodology, we collaborated with domain experts in port logistics to identify and confirm 12 pivotal factors that support the green digital transformation of ports. The research shows that the most critical success factors for using digital technology to drive ports’ green transformation are green supply chain information platforms, intelligent vessel scheduling, traffic optimization, and digital carbon emission monitoring. This study significantly contributes to the literature on green port transformation, offering indispensable practical insights for port operators, government entities, and shipping firms in identifying and deploying these key success factors. The findings will help maritime supply chain stakeholders develop actionable digital strategies, improving port efficiency and ecological resilience.
... Optimizing transshipment processes requires establishing clear and achievable goals. Kunpeng, Gharehgozli, & Lee [11] emphasize the value of employing SMART objectives in this context. By setting Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound goals, organizations can ensure focused direction for their optimization efforts. ...
This paperwork explores the transshipment operations at the Port of
Constanta, Romania, focusing on the unloading of big bags from barges. Utilizing
Business Process Management (BPM) software, the study models the
transshipment process to identify optimization opportunities. The investigation
reveals challenges such as coordination complexities and potential cargo damage,
alongside the benefits of cost-efficiency and flexibility offered by transshipment
services. Through literature review and analysis, the study emphasizes the
importance of efficient business processes and the role of BPM software in
enhancing operational efficiency. By employing Aura Portal Modeller for
simulation, the study identifies bottlenecks and proposes optimization strategies for
the transshipment process. The proposed measures include real-time cargo
assessment, inventory tracking systems, equipment analysis, and storage layout
optimization. This research contributes to the understanding of transshipment
operations and highlights the effectiveness of BPM software in process
visualization and analysis, offering insights for enhancing efficiency and mitigating
delays in supply chain management
... Besides, with the increasing number of users adopting digital technology, the network externality is availed to simplify information exchange among authorities and other stakeholders, thus strengthening port operations and improving work efficiency. Therefore, adding network externality into the traditional model at busy ports is a cost-efficient method (Li et al., 2023). ...
As a fundamental transportation mode, maritime logistics has become an indispensable component on a global scale. However, there are multiple drawbacks associated with ports operating in traditional ways, such as higher cost, lower efficiency and generating more environmental pollution. Digital technologies have been researched and implemented gradually in green ports, especially in data collection and real-time monitoring, and these advances help to promote higher work efficiency and reduce detrimental environmental impacts. It was found that green ports (e.g. ports of Raffina, Los Angeles, and Long Beach) generally perform better in energy conservation and pollutant emission reduction. However, considering the variability in the level of digitalization, there are challenges in achieving effective communications between individual ports. Therefore, to optimize and update green port practices, a systematic review is necessary to comprehensively analyze the beneficial contributions of green ports. This review adopted bibliometric analysis to examine the shipping framework focusing on green ports digitalization and innovation. After that, with regards to the bibliometric results, five aspects were analyzed, including environment, performance, policy, technology, and management. Besides, intelligent life-cycle management was systematically discussed to improve green ports and maritime logistics performance and sustainability in three aspects, namely waste discharge, shipping management system and green ports management. The findings revealed that green ports and maritime logistics require digital cooperation, transformation, and management to achieve sustainable development goals, including route selection and control of ships' numbers, weather prediction, and navigational effluent monitoring, albeit with some obstacles.
Under the mounting pressure to make changes to become more environmentally friendly and sustainable, port authorities have been exploring effective solutions to reduce CO2 emissions. In this regard, alternative fuels, innovative technology, and optimization strategies are key pathways for ports to transition toward a low-carbon pattern. In this review work, the current development status and characteristics of renewable and clean energy in ports were meticulously analyzed. The CO2 emission reduction effects and limitations of port microgrids, carbon capture, and other technological operations were thoroughly examined. Lastly, the emission reduction optimization strategies ports could adopt under different scenarios were evaluated. The research findings showed that (1) combining the characteristics of the port and quantifying the properties of different renewable energy sources and low-carbon fuels is extremely necessary to select suitable alternative energy sources for port development; (2) technological advancements, multi-party interests, and policy impacts were the primary factors influencing the development of emission reduction technology methods; and (3) the coordinated optimization of multiple objectives in cross-scenarios was the main direction for ports to achieve sustainable development. This study provides theoretical guidance to ports that are transitioning to a greener pattern, as well as pointing out future research directions and development spaces for researchers.
Seaborne trade plays a vital role in global trade by facilitating the movement of cargo across the globe. However, maritime transactions are characterized by inherent complexity and frequently exhibit deficiencies in transparency and operational efficiency. This is due to primary factors such as substantial amount of paperwork, ineffective data sharing and processing, system incompatibilities, and a lack of logistic transparency and real-time traceability. Blockchain is a decentralized information technology that offers a promising solution to the ongoing challenges in maritime business. We comprehensively review the literature on blockchain and conduct a synthesis analysis of the benefits and challenges of implementing blockchain in the maritime industry. We demonstrate that blockchain could improve operational efficiency, enhance logistics security and transparency, reduce transaction costs and time, improve sustainability, as well as build trust among participants.
Operations research techniques have helped optimize container terminal operations over the past decades and have been a regular feature of maritime logistics and maritime supply chain literature in addition to being in practice at container terminals across the globe. Our systematic review collated through Scopus, 1768 papers published in the domain and analyzed them to find the main research clusters, and explore future research directions. Studies on both quayside and landside planning are grouped in five research clusters: discussing simulation, scheduling, automation, quayside operations, integrated operations and container transportation. In addition, the evolution of optimization techniques in planning container terminal operations is discussed, along with the suggested trajectory of the research agenda under each cluster. The analysis finds that genetic algorithms, integer linear programming and heuristics are the most widely used operations research techniques in container terminal optimization. While clusters of research in areas such as simulating container terminal operations, scheduling operations and automated terminals have received a great deal of attention, research focusing on integrated and dynamic operations has been scarce over the past years, suggesting a new area of contributions. The review proposes the application of methods such as neural network- and deep learning models related to artificial intelligence to widen our understanding of container terminal operations.
Modern ports face significant challenges as strategic nodes of global supply chains, being responsible for the coordination of inbound and outbound flows at deep-sea and in hinterland transport corridors. Digitization and the adoption of disruptive technologies can help ports to tide over operational challenges. Automated Ground Vehicles (AGVs) are an integral part of operations at many modern ports, especially inside container terminals. With the shift to automated transport outside of the terminal areas, these AGVs may form platoons to establish an efficient port hinterland transport corridor. In this work, we propose a new robust optimization approach to assess the time and cost-efficiency of applying such AGV platoons in a container pickup and delivery problem. We develop a bi-objective mixed-integer programming model, which simultaneously minimizes time and cost elements, and also considers emissions. Each transportation task can be carried out by AGVs or conventional trucks, while the number of available vehicles for each mode is uncertain (as they are used to connect different modalities of container transport). The robust optimization model is based on an ellipsoidal uncertainty set to handle this uncertainty and an augmented epsilon constraint method to obtain Pareto-optimal solutions for this multi-objective problem. The developed framework is evaluated in two case studies: the Port of Rotterdam in The Netherlands and the Port of Valparaíso in Chile, with different traveling distances in corridors to a dry port (200 km) and a pre-terminal (11 km), respectively. The results indicate that the new direct delivery scheme by AGV platoons is significantly more cost- and time-efficient than the benchmark and provides a low-carbon emission transportation mode. While the benefits of decreased dwell times (56% on average) and carbon emissions (on average by 10%) are similar for short and long traveling distances, the savings in cost increase (from 4.9% to 8%) with the increased distance in the Rotterdam case.
Accurate vessels’ estimated time of arrival to ports is an important information to ensure efficient port operations management. At all stages of ports and vessels operations planning, arrival times are key milestones. Therefore, the variation of vessels’ arrival times affects port operations and causes disruptions along the global port chain. For this reason, intelligent systems are needed to predict vessels’ estimated time of arrival to speed up rescheduling operations in case of perturbation. This study addresses the problem of predicting bulk vessels’ estimated time of arrival to the destination port. For that, we propose an approach based on Deep Learning sequence models and using different data sources including the Automatic Identification System historical traffic data. This study shows how both recurrent and convolutional neural networks can leverage vessel historical voyage data to predict travel time to the destination.
The past few years have certainly been quite eventful and the thing that probably overshadowed all others was the COVID-19 pandemic. This coincided with a period of fundamental changes in maritime transport, including energy transition and the need to decarbonize shipping, the digitalization of global supply chains, and the continued trend towards vertical and horizontal integration in shipping and ports.
The pandemic revealed systemic fallacies, but also showed the potential, as well as the need, for change. Such change is possible if we understand the systemic causes of the situation and if we can imagine ways to resolve systemic challenges. For those studying maritime transport, this means the need to assess how the governance of the maritime sector can respond to current challenges, and – better – pre-empt and prepare for similar future occurrences.
The pandemic brought to the surface again an issue we had all thought of as dead: inflation. Starting with Joe Stiglitz (2002), a number of economists had believed that globalization and the diversification of sources of supply around the world would strengthen competition, keeping prices constantly down. This however presupposed that disruptions would be localized. The pandemic, however, ‘attacked’ the whole planet simultaneously and the interconnectedness of maritime systems we describe below led to disruptions in ‘global’ supply chains. Inflation thus ensued followed by shortages, supply bottlenecks, port congestion, and very high ocean tariffs. These and more are analysed below by our authors and ourselves, in an effort to seek proposals which could hopefully improve the resilience of our systems to future shocks.
One more prediction is made here, not included in the article, and not (yet) discussed by economists: Textbook Keynesian economics (and this is what we are living today with all these covid recovery fundings) prescribes that the 2022 inflationary euphoria will be followed by an economic recession; let us hope this would be light and short-lived.
The arising awareness of drug safety has brought tremendous demands on improving traceability and transparency in the supply chain. Conventionally, centralized/distributed database-based traceability platforms are adopted by many drug companies to control drug quality and improve transparency levels. However, it is still challenging to link drug stakeholders into an information-sharing chain due to the potential data manipulations and interest conflicts. In this context, this paper proposes a unified five-layer Blockchain and Internet of Things-based smart tracking and tracing (BIoT³, in short) platform to provide a decentralized traceability solution in the drug supply chain. Following the five-layer blockchain platform architecture, a practical roadmap is provided for the drug industry to achieve blockchain design, development, application, and evaluation. Moreover, three core enabling components are presented: IoT-based drug identity management, on-chain & off-chain mechanism, smart contract-enabled drug services. According to the real data from collaborating companies, the feasibility and efficiency of the BIoT³ platform have been verified using Hyperledger Fabric blockchain. The case study demonstrates that it not only gains useful insights into transaction sizes configuration for optimal blockchain performance, but also provides a feasible blockchain-based solution for drug traceability and visibility.
As an essential carrier of cross-border trade, the maritime supply chain has always been plagued by long service cycles, complex structures, and heterogeneous information from multiple sources. In this context, as a distributed database system, the emerging blockchain technology has the characteristics of decentralization, tamper-proofness, and traceability, which can be correctly applied in the maritime industry to promote its transformation and upgrading. However, blockchain application in the maritime supply chain remains notably absent, leaving this critical topic almost unexplored. Thus, we first conduct a comprehensive literature review and an industrial investigation to clarify the current status, problems, and challenges of the blockchain-based maritime supply chain system (BMSCS). We construct a new operation management mode of the maritime supply chain and propose an integrated BMSCS suitable for global economic development. Finally, based on comparison of the current research results, reasonable suggestions for the future operation and development of the BMSCS are put forward to enhance the coordination among members, accelerate the application of blockchain in the maritime industry, and gradually realise the intelligent operation of the maritime supply chain. ARTICLE HISTORY
We build a multi-period pricing model between a blockchain-technology-supported platform and a traditional platform, where the blockchain-technology-supported platform provides a higher value for customers. Customers are influenced by network effect, that is, they value a platform more if the platform has more users. As either platform can adopt static pricing or dynamic pricing, four scenarios may occur. By deriving the equilibrium of each scenario, we reveal the 'Matthew effect' caused by network effect, that platform advantage (from adopting blockchain technology) or disadvantage (from not adopting blockchain technology) accumulates as time goes by. Thus, platforms are advised to adopt the blockchain technology antecedent to the competitors. Network effect, which amplifies the benefit of initial users, may intensify price competition and harm both platforms. By comparing the four scenarios, we derive the equilibrium pricing strategies: when network effect is weak, one platform adopts static pricing and the other adopts dynamic pricing; when network effect is medium, the blockchain-technology-supported platform adopts static pricing and the traditional platform adopts dynamic pricing; and when network effect is strong, both platforms adopt dynamic pricing. Dynamic pricing is more desirable for the traditional platform relative to the blockchain-technology-supported platform.
Digitalization has become a widely used term both in professional language and in scientific literature. It may be seen as a manifestation of technological progression which has been traditionally given a strong emphasis in theories of economic growth. The roots of digitalization are thus old, but the terminology has experienced rapid growth during the last decades. This paper focuses on the future prospects of digitalization in Finnish ports operating international trade and transports. In the case of transport, logistics, and ports the public sector has, mainly through ministries and offices focusing on economic development and employment, initiated numerous development programs with foresight ambitions. Commonly, these programs have a mid-range target setting referring to a 5–10-years time span into the future. The primary data is collected from two workshops (group interviews). As a result, the research identifies the main drivers and technologies that are significant for port digitalization. These are discussed in the context of three alternative scenarios: Digital supremacy; business as usual; and digital failure. These three scenarios are classified with SWOT (Strengths; Weaknesses; Opportunities; Threats) and PESTEL (Political; Economic; Social; Technological; Environmental; Legal) frameworks. It is assumed that the actualized future development will follow the mid-sections of the scenarios depending on global trends in politics and trade that impact the supply and demand that underlie the need for transport.
Loading and unloading rolling cargo in roll-on/roll-off are important and very recurrent operations in maritime logistics. In this paper, we apply state-of-the-art deep reinforcement learning algorithms to automate these operations in a complex and real environment. The objective is to teach an autonomous tug master to manage rolling cargo and perform loading and unloading operations while avoiding collisions with static and dynamic obstacles along the way. The artificial intelligence agent, representing the tug master, is trained and evaluated in a challenging environment based on the Unity3D learning framework, called the ML-Agents, and using proximal policy optimization. The agent is equipped with sensors for obstacle detection and is provided with real-time feedback from the environment thanks to its own reward function, allowing it to dynamically adapt its policies and navigation strategy. The performance evaluation shows that by choosing appropriate hyperparameters, the agents can successfully learn all required operations including lane-following, obstacle avoidance, and rolling cargo placement. This study also demonstrates the potential of intelligent autonomous systems to improve the performance and service quality of maritime transport.
Free access to full text https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03088839.2020.1825855
Blockchain technology has become one of the emerging technologies set to disrupt the maritime industry. Maritime companies are increasingly
exploring to adopt blockchain to stay ahead of competition. However,
studies on blockchain applications in the maritime sector have been
scarce and most of them are confined to a specific sector like the maritime
shipping sector. Therefore, this study is motivated to provide a thorough
analysis of blockchain applications from the perspectives of different
sectors in the industry. It also aims to develop a novel conceptual framework to provide a holistic view of blockchain adoption in the industry and
guide future research. The implication analysis of blockchain adoption
indicates that for industry organisations, a good understanding of blockchain and their own specific problems and requirements is key before
adopting the technology. For government agencies, technical code for
blockchain can be utilised to govern blockchain innovation with the same
effects as legal code. Lastly, recommendations are provided to various
maritime stakeholders to seize the emerging opportunities provided by
blockchain and mitigate relevant risks.
In recent years, exchange of goods around the world has mostly been done by the sea, which increased the pollution coming from the port areas. Activities connected with shipping and handling of goods in ports may harm both human health and the environment. These activities include different (mostly diesel-fueled) machinery used in ports, resulting in air emissions including GHG, NOX, SOX, PM, etc. Besides air pollution, port activities affect noise, light, and odor emission, waste accumulation and water pollution. Existing methodologies for estimating environmental impacts of port activities are mostly qualitative and include self-assessment methods which can often lead to biased results. Because of that, there is a need for a quantitative, industry-validated, and cohesive method that would give more accurate results. In this article, the Port Environmental Index (PEI) which has all the attributes described above will be presented. The PEI mission is to integrate all of the main environmental aspects of port such as air emission, waste production, water pollution, noise, light, and odor pollution into one metric that can then be used to assess the port performance and make comparison between ports. The PEI is made as a quantitative composite index based on aggregations of individual indicators for significant aspects of port operations. It includes different indices according to the source of the emission; the Ship Environmental Index (SEI), the Terminal Environmental Index (TEI), and the Port Authority Environmental Index (PAEI). While designing the PEI, correctly choosing the environmental impacts is paramount to properly identify port activities and associated environmental aspects. After their identification, for each significant aspect, a set of representative environmental key performance indicators (eKPIs) is identified. Afterwards, a series of mathematical operations are to be applied: normalization, weighting and aggregation. In this short communication, those methods are outlined yet not definitively chosen. The main idea behind the PEI is to use quantitative, data-based information collected automatically leveraging Internet of Things (IoT) techniques making it possible to assess the environmental impacts of port operations in real-time. The advantages of having such metric in the environmental management plan of a port are numerous. Amongst the most remarkable, it allows inter-port comparison and it can be used for decision making to estimate the impacts using one single metric rather than having many disperse values. Moreover, it can be used by ports for estimating their environmental performance and progress. Since it is based on information collected using IoT technologies provided in real-time, ports can make immediate corrections in their activities.
The transport and logistics sector, by its nature, requires an intensive and efficient exchange of data for effective management and decision-making. The maritime sector requires a special treatment due to the complex and heterogeneous environment. The rapid adoption of IoT technologies in the naval industry will facilitate the effective management of primary services, including vessel tracking, emissions control, predictive maintenance, safety and welfare. This article describes IoT solutions adapted to the current needs of the sector. The proposals are aligned with the SMARTSEA project, which aims to develop an interactive MSc course on Maritime and Surveyor ICT/IoT systems, helping complete the market void in technical and maintenance specialists generated by the prompt expansion of the Smart Maritime & Surveying industry.
Two‐sided platforms are often coupled with exclusive hardware products that connect two sides of users, the consumers of the hardware product (i.e., buyers) and the application developers (i.e., sellers). The hardware product in the platform business model introduces three important issues that are not yet well understood in the literature of platform pricing: potentially downward‐trending production cost, product quality improvements, and consumers' strategic behaviors. Using analytical modeling, our study explicitly factors in these issues in analyzing a monopoly platform owner's two‐sided pricing problem. The platform sequentially introduces and prices quality‐improving hardware products, for which the costliness of quality may decrease. Strategic buyers make purchasing and upgrading decisions, which dynamically determines the buyer‐side network size. Meanwhile, the seller‐side network size is determined endogenously. We find that, an increase in the likelihood or magnitude of future costliness reduction raises the initial buyer‐side price of the low‐quality product and lowers the seller‐side fee. This strategy, in turn, creates an indirect intertemporal effect that allows the platform to also raise the buyer‐side price(s) of the product(s) sold later. These findings contrast with conventional wisdom and provide an economic explanation for premium introductory pricing of many platform products. Moreover, we find that strengthening the network effect can result in more pronounced increases in the buyer‐side prices.
We seek to guide operations management (OM) research on the implementation of supply chain traceability systems by identifying business requirements and the factors critical to successful implementation. We first motivate the need for implementing traceability systems in two very different industries-cobalt mining and pharmaceuticals-and present business requirements and critical success factors for implementation. Next, we describe how we carried out thematic analysis of practitioner and scholarly articles on implementing blockchain for supply chain traceability. Finally, we present our results pertaining to the needs of different stakeholders such as suppliers, consumers, and regulators. The business requirements for traceability systems are curbing illegal practices; improving sustainability performance; increasing operational efficiency; enhancing supply-chain coordination; and sensing market trends. Critical success factors for implementation are companies' capabilities; collaboration; technology maturity; supply chain practices; leadership; and governance of the traceability efforts. These findings provide a nascent measurement model for empirical work and a foundation for descriptive and normative research on blockchain applications for supply chain traceability.
The extant literature has conceptually argued that Blockchain technology can provide both financial and operational benefits to firms in international trades. However, no studies have systematically and analytically investigated the effectiveness of Blockchain. This study introduces analytical models that consider the implementation of Blockchain technology in international trades, to test whether the technology improves an exporting firm’s performance under demand volatility risk. The simulation and numerical analysis results show that the reduced lead time and de-creased ocean transport cost under Blockchain enable the exporting firm to increase shipment via the ocean, which reduces the quantity shipped via air. In addition, the reduced total unit cost for ocean and air transports leads the firm to effectively reserve spaces for air transport, which implies that Blockchain makes the firm more proactive while preparing a backup plan to more effectively and efficiently react to demand realization. We conclude that Blockchain can be beneficial for firms facing considerable demand volatility in international trades, and that such effectiveness could be more effective for firms that prioritize minimizing lost sales (by efficiently utilizing ocean and effectively exploiting air) over minimizing excess quantity shipped by ocean.
Container terminals play an important role in the transportation of containerized goods in global supply chains. The number of containers handled in container terminals has increased astronomically. To accommodate and handle the increasing number of containers entering and leaving container terminals, their layout has seen several changes. New layouts require smaller footprint and must ensure faster, cheaper, and more efficient transfer of containers between the landside and seaside. This paper first reviews the literature on the transition of terminal layout designs from traditional to automated and future container terminals. Second, the relevant research needs to address strategic and tactical layout design problems are listed.
Reliable freight rate forecasts are essential to stimulate ocean transportation and ensure stakeholder benefits in a highly volatile shipping market. However, compared to traditional time-series approaches, there are few studies using artificial intelligence techniques (e.g. artificial neural networks, ANNs) to forecast shipping freight rates, and fewer still incorporating forward freight agreement (FFA) information for freight rate forecasts. The aim of this paper is to examine the ability of FFAs to improve forecasting accuracy. We use two different dynamic ANN models, NARNET and NARXNET, and we compare their performance for 1, 2, 3 and 6 months ahead. The accuracy of the forecasting models is evaluated with the use of mean squared error (MSE), based on actual secondary data including historical Baltic Panamax Index (BPI) data (available online), and primary data on Baltic forward assessment (BFA) collected from the Baltic Exchange. The experimental results show that, in general, NARXNET outperforms NARNET in all forecast horizons, revealing the importance of the information contained in FFAs in improving forecasting accuracy. Our findings provide better forecasts and insights into the future movements of freight markets and help rationalise chartering decisions.
We develop a theory that shows signaling a firm’s fundamental quality (e.g., its operational
capabilities) to lenders through inventory transactions to be more efficient—it leads to less
costly operational distortions—than signaling through loan requests, and we characterize how
the efficiency gains depend on firm operational characteristics such as operating costs, market
size, and inventory salvage value. Signaling through inventory being only tenable when inventory
transactions are verifiable at low enough cost, we then turn our attention to how this verifiability
can be achieved in practice and argue that blockchain technology could enable it more efficiently
than traditional monitoring mechanisms. To demonstrate, we develop b verify, an open-source
blockchain protocol that leverages Bitcoin to provide supply chain transparency at scale and
in a cost effective way. The paper identifies an important benefit of blockchain adoption—by
opening a window of transparency into a firm’s supply chain, blockchain technology furnishes
the ability to secure favorable financing terms at lower signaling costs. Furthermore, the analysis
of the preferred signaling mode sheds light on what types of firms or supply chains would stand
to benefit the most from this use of blockchain technology.
Smart ports can be regarded as the solution that addresses the new challenges faced by international trade and logistics systems. By deeply integrating digital technologies, such as the Internet of Things, big data, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence, smart ports can greatly increase their capacity for intelligent operation and optimal allocation of resources in port operation, which will enable continuous improvement in the competitiveness of ports as they meet the various challenges ahead. In this paper a systematic bibliometric review of smart ports is conducted by analyzing the existing publications related to smart ports. The development status of studies on smart ports is discussed, and both existing problems and key research gaps in this field are identified. In addition, performance indicators and future development trends are discussed. The purpose of this work is to lay a solid academic foundation in the field of smart ports, and to propose open research directions that will stimulate interest in this area. Furthermore, through an in-depth analysis of the existing studies on smart ports, the problems existing in current smart port studies are revealed, and targeted suggestions are put forward, which will have a positive impact on smart port studies in the future.
Ships and ports are ripe for operation without humans — but only if the maritime industry can work through the practical, legal and economic implications first. Ships and ports are ripe for operation without humans — but only if the maritime industry can work through the practical, legal and economic implications first.
Electric vehicles (EVs) are an important part of the solution to climate change due to their reduction in carbon emissions. Purchase subsidies have been efficient tools in overcoming the cost barrier. In this paper, we formulate an analytical model to study the impact of EV anxiety and EVs’ environmental benefits on optimal subsidy and pricing decisions. We consider a market consisting of a vehicle manufacturer, a social planner and two segments of consumers: green and non-green. Both segments have EV anxiety. The manufacturer produces and sells both EVs and traditional vehicles. EV purchase decisions are influenced by consumers’ EV anxiety, preference for EVs, EV subsidy amounts, and retail prices for both EVs and traditional vehicles. Our results justify the necessity of a subsidy program in promoting EV sales. We identify the optimal subsidy under various market conditions. We further analyze how environmental benefit and consumers’ EV anxiety impact the optimal subsidy decisions. We find that it is optimal to offer the maximum level of subsidy when the environmental benefit is above a certain threshold value. Our results also show that the optimal subsidy either decreases or increases in consumers’ EV anxiety, depending on the level of environmental benefit of EVs. In addition, we show that EV anxiety has both positive and negative effects on the demand for EVs, but overall harms EV adoption.
Sea ports play an essential role in oceanic transport of cargo in global supply chains. Today, the maritime industry is facing many challenges, including efficiently and effectively integrating national and international participants. The lack of transparency and flexibility results in lengthened shipping time, worsened service levels, waste of resources, and higher costs. This challenge can be addressed with the use of Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) as a major component of modern Port Information Systems. The main purpose of this case is to study how the application of EDI can improve port operations at Mapulo, Zuanbia in Southeast Asia. This case helps students and practitioners understand important information systems related issues in port operations. In addition, the case allows both groups to consider further refinements, given that most emerging countries are often faced with a lack of resources. This is a fictitious case. The data cited in the case are based upon the implementation of EDI at an actual port in an emerging nation but the name and location of the port have been disguised. Any similarity contained herein to actual persons, businesses, events, etc. is purely coincidental and is the responsibility of the author(s). Please contact the case author(s) directly with any concerns.
Despite the significant fluctuations in global trend due to the rising trade friction and the COVID19 pandemic, the container terminals are continuously working in three technology areas including automation, electrification and digitalization. This study reviewed recent technology trends as well as relevant research topics related to the container terminals, and investigated how the trends and topics would facilitate the terminals to achieve their strategic objectives. We also studied the trends in the container terminal industry before and after the pandemic outbreak. Recent progress shows that generally the long-term plans remain unchanged while there are some changes in timeline and priorities. The findings suggest that despite the common interest in long-term plans, gaps are still identified between academia and industry interests. Future directions are discussed for these technology areas, particularly in the context of the post-pandemic world, where the limited resources should be invested to the most urgent areas.
Artificial intelligence and data analytics capabilities have enabled the introduction of automation, such as robotics and Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs), across different sectors of the production spectrum which successively has profound implications for operational efficiency and productivity. However, the environmental sustainability implications of such innovations have not been yet extensively addressed in the extant literature. This study evaluates the use of AGVs in container terminals by investigating the environmental sustainability gains that arise from the adoption of artificial intelligence and automation for shoreside operations at freight ports. Through a comprehensive literature review, we reveal this research gap across the use of artificial intelligence and decision support systems, as well as optimisation models. A real-world container terminal is used, as a case study in a simulation environment, on Europe’s fastest-growing container port (Piraeus), to quantify the environmental benefits related to routing scenarios via different types of AGVs. Our study contributes to the cross-section of operations management and artificial intelligence literature by articulating design principles to inform effective digital technology interventions at non-automated port terminals, both at operational and management levels.
Blockchain technology has seen increasingly important practical applications. The literature has expanded greatly in the past four to five years. One area that has seen significant application and growth is in supply chain management—which includes transportation and logistics. The growth of this literature has also resulted in several literature reviews—each has specific scope and emphasis. Of the growing number of literature review and bibliometric analysis studies, the focus has ranged from understanding application cases, themes, trends, and methodologies. Theoretical developments and theorizing have been limited for supply chain management in general and even more limited for sustainable supply chains. Arguably, much of the current research has been relatively atheoretical—a lack of theory development and theory application. Hence, we conclude the existing blockchain research discourse has been centered around application and less around the theory. As a sub-discipline, the nexus of blockchain and supply chain management is still in the early developmental stages. Using a critical synthesis review of the literature, this paper focuses on the most popular theories that have been applied to explain blockchain adoption and implementation within supply chains—how each theory explains the motivations, formalizes the organizational process around the acceptance of blockchain technology, and predicts the outcomes of blockchain-supported business models. Current theoretical gaps and potential future theorizing are discussed. Potential theories that have been used for other technologies (i.e., the internet of things) which have not been applied to the blockchain context are provided and discussed. The comprehensive and systematic theory review has important theoretical and managerial implications for both academia by advancing multiple academic disciplines and practice with insights into actual acceptance and usage of blockchain and other disruptive technologies.
The ongoing boom in platform retailing has been accompanied by widespread counterfeiting. Blockchain technology has attracted much attention as a way to combat this practice. We consider a supply chain system consisting of one brand seller, one counterfeiter and one platform retailer and examine how blockchain adoption affects the decisions of firms in this system and the performance of the whole system. We show that the platform’s use of blockchain reduces both products’ selling price and increases the brand seller’s demand while also increasing the counterfeiter’s demand under certain conditions when a wholesale contract is adopted. Moreover, we find that blockchain technology could be an effective anticounterfeit tool but that the platform does not always use it, even if its implementation is costless. The platform is more willing to use blockchain when imitation good’s quality is relatively low, and an agency contract can better incentivize the platform to deploy blockchain than a wholesale contract if the commission fee is large. Finally, consumer surplus and social welfare may decrease after the platform adopts blockchain, but the whole supply chain system can perform better through the platform’s blockchain implementation if the imitation good’s quality and consumers’ trust in the platform are low.
With the growth of ocean transport and with increasing vessel sizes, managing congestion at the landside of container terminals has become a major challenge. The landside of a sea terminal handles containers that arrive or depart via train or truck. Large sea terminals have to handle thousands of trucks and dozens of trains per day. As trains run on fixed schedule, their containers are prioritized in stacking and internal transport handling. This has consequences for the service of external trucks, which might be subject to delays. We analyze the impact of prioritization on such delays using a stochastic stylized semi-open queuing network model with bulk arrivals (of containers on trains), shared stack crane resources, and multi-class containers. We use the theory of regenerative processes and Markov chain analysis to analyze the network. The proposed network solution algorithm works for large-scale systems and yields sufficiently accurate estimates for performance measurement. The model can capture priority service for containers at the shared stack cranes, while preserving strict handling priorities. The model is used to explore the choice of different internal transport vehicles (with coupled versus decoupled operations at the stack and train gantry cranes) to understand the effect on delays. Our results show that decoupled transport vehicles in comparison to coupled vehicles can mitigate the external truck container handling delays at shared stack cranes by a large extent (up to 12%). However, decoupled vehicles marginally increase the train container handling delays at shared stack cranes (up to 6%). When train arrival rates are low, prioritizing the handling of train containers at the stack cranes significantly reduces their delays. Further, such prioritization hardly delays external truck containers.
Geographical location, infrastructures, and services are traditionally the pillars of a port. In the last years, emerging Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) were identified as a new pillar. Today new benefits and challenges are connected with the introduction of shared emerging ICTs among decision-makers inside ports. The crucial issue concerns the fact that several decision-makers could share a decision about a single port operation. Therefore, the effectiveness and efficiency of ports depend on how the interactions between the decision-makers are solved. The paper describes Transportation System Models to explain how ports could benefit, in terms of costs reduction, of the potentialities offered by emerging ICTs in solving interactions among decision-makers. Moreover, the paper presents a critical analysis of some representative case studies of the presence of Port Community Systems and emerging ICTs inside ports, in order to aggregate the observed trends in some macro-classes.
With increasing uncertainties in the global economy, companies are facing fierce competition. Blockchain has the potential to enhance companies’ competitiveness by streamlining processes, improving productivity and reducing costs. It is meaningful to study whether and when companies would adopt blockchain and under what conditions. We develop a game theoretic model to analyse the introduction of blockchain to companies from a big customer with bargaining power. In this study, ship operators need to decide their optimal adoption time when facing a request from a big shipper to adopt blockchain with a threat of substitution policy from the shipper. An algorithm is developed to obtain the numerical solutions of ship operators’ optimal adoption time. Our analysis suggests that 1) the substitution policy only matters to small companies and is only necessary under fixed pricing model; 2) a threshold applies for substitution ratio and cut-off time to effectively induce small companies to adopt blockchain early; 3) blockchain developers should consider mixed pricing model instead of fixed pricing model for faster and wider blockchain adoption; 4) blockchain initiators should focus more on improving the technology’s cost-effectiveness rather than rely heavily on externalities like substitution policies to promote blockchain adoption.
Ports are pivotal nodes in supply chain and transportation networks, in which most of the existing data remain underutilized. Machine learning methods are versatile tools to utilize and harness the hidden power of the data. Considering ever-growing adoption of machine learning as a data-driven decision-making tool, the port industry is far behind other modes of transportation in this transition. To fill the gap, we aimed to provide a comprehensive systematic literature review on this topic to analyze the previous research from different perspectives such as area of the application, type of application, machine learning method, data, and location of the study. Results showed that the number of articles in the field has been increasing annually, and the most prevalent use case of machine learning methods is to predict different port characteristics. However, there are emerging prescriptive and autonomous use cases of machine learning methods in the literature. Furthermore, research gaps and challenges are identified, and future research directions have been discussed from method-centric and application-centric points of view.
The role of seaports has evolved from being simple sea/land interfaces to becoming increasingly value-adding entities in global supply chains. A port that is today at the forefront of this trend is characterized as a fifth generation (5G) port, a “smart port” or, more recently, a Port 4.0. These characterisations, introduced by Maritime Studies literature, are closely equivalent to the business model concept developed by the Strategic Management literature in the last decades. This research paper inquires on the influence that Industry 4.0 technologies might have on the adoption of more sophisticated business models by seaports, and the mechanisms through which this influence is driven: in particular the role that technology push and market pull mechanisms might play. To this end, it develops a conceptual model that aims to provide an explanation of the relationship between the adoption of Industry 4.0 technologies and the evolution of seaports' business models. This model is then evaluated against an exploratory case study on the port of Barcelona. Finally, the paper explores what would “smartness” mean in a seaport context
In this paper, we explore why users’ experiences with emerging supply chain technologies comprise inflated expectations followed by disappointment in the early stages of adoption, as per the Gartner Hype Cycle. We used "affordance theory" to study how managers perceive emerging technologies to explain their adoption experience. Affordance theory indicates that perceived benefits – and goals and constraints – depend on the interaction between technology and the users, not on the technology alone. First, we used the literature for two purposes: first, to obtain characteristics of blockchain, Internet of Things (IoT), and artificial intelligence (AI) as emerging technologies; and second, to itemize generic goals, affordances, and constraints in adopting any supply chain technology. Next, we asked 400+ supply‐chain managers to select those affordances, constraints, and goals that they viewed as pertinent to their organizations’ supply chains for whichever of these three technologies they were implementing. Finally, we compared the responses across technologies for individual respondents (who selected more than one technology) and within the pool of respondents. We found that respondents who selected more than one technology made distinct selections individually for the different technologies relevant to them. The pooled responses across all respondents, however, prioritized the aggregated goals, affordances, and constraints in the same way, regardless of the technology, the organization, or the network features of the supply chain. Overall, it appears that the characteristics of the technology do not inform user expectations at the early stages of adoption. This initial disconnect—between characteristics and expectation—may explain the "inflated expectations" followed by the early "trough of disappointment" with emerging technologies in the Gartner Hype Cycle, as users focus on obtaining the same benefits for the supply chain from any new emerging technology. Only subsequent shared experiences can lead to the long "slope of enlightenment." This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved
With produce's perishability and quality heterogeneity, unethical producers may claim false quality of their products in non-traceable produce supply chains (PSCs) to increase their orders and prices. The latest traceability technology, such as blockchain, offers a promising solution to circumvent this problem as it enables incorruptible visibility throughout the chain. In this paper, we develop a game theoretical model to explore the traceability value of combating unethical producer behavior in PSCs. We consider a PSC with heterogeneous producers (with different quality) and retailers (with different quality-price-ratio (QPR) preferences) under two scenarios: a non-traceable PSC (NPSC) and a traceable PSC (TPSC). Our results suggest that lacking traceability in a PSC will cause adverse selection, i.e., the producers will adopt symmetric quality claim and wholesale price decisions in NPSC. In TPSC, traceability enables the high-quality producers to enjoy higher wholesale prices and, in the meantime, higher market shares than the low-quality ones. Consequently, traceability can benefit the high-quality producers in most cases. However, the retailers cannot benefit from traceability because it reduces competition on the supply side and enables the high-quality producers to exploit their purchase power by strategically differentiating the QPRs of their products. Observing that traceability only benefits one stakeholder, we propose an incentive scheme to coordinate the chain and identify the conditions under which the high-quality producers will voluntarily share their real quality information to achieve a win-win situation with the retailers. Overall, traceability and the proposed incentive scheme can add value to a PSC when there are a small number of producers selling high-quality products on it. Finally, we extend our base model to analyze the impacts of consumers' quality consciousness, producers' ethics levels, and products' in-transit spoilage conditions on the traceability value in PSCs.
Automated deep-sea container terminals are the main hubs to move millions of containers in today's global supply chains. Terminal operators often decouple the landside and waterside operations by stacking containers in stacks perpendicular to the quay. Traditionally, a single automated stacking cranes (ASC) is deployed at each stack to handle containers. A recent trend is to use new configurations with more than one crane to improve efficiency. A variety of new configurations have been implemented, such as twin, double, and triple ASCs. In this paper, the authors explore and review the mixed integer programming models that have been developed for the stacking operations of these new configurations. They further discuss how these models can be extended to contemplate diverse operational constraints including precedence constraints, interference constraints, and other objective functions.
This study explores the interplay between blockchain technology (BCT) adoption and channel selection in combating counterfeits and examines the impact of this interaction on consumer surplus (CS) and social welfare (SW). Firstly, analytical models are developed to examine four scenarios (with and without BCT adoption and two channel scenarios). Secondly, the impacts of BCT adoption and channel selection decisions on CS and SW are analyzed. Finally, we relax our assumptions to consider the presence of the dual-channel sales model, risk-averse consumers, and expert consumers. The main findings are as follows: (1) Genuine companies should sometimes sell through dual sales channels before adopting BCT; however, they should always sell through a single sales channel after adopting BCT. Furthermore, BCT changes the optimal single sales channel from the retailer channel to the direct sales channel when the proportion of deceptive counterfeits in the direct sales channel is relatively high. (2) Both consumers and the whole society will benefit from the deployment of BCT when all sales channels of a company are either less reliable or highly unreliable. (3) BCT is valuable in combating counterfeits, especially when the risk aversion level of consumers is not sufficiently low or the proportion of expert consumers is sufficiently low.
The globalisation of the food industry increases the complexity and the difficulty in enhancing efficiency and solving issues in food supply chains. Blockchain is a promising decentralised information technology that could benefit food supply chains by reducing transaction cost and time, increasing process transparency, security, and efficiency, as well as building trust among participants. In this paper, we introduce the major blockchain platforms currently used in food supply chains and conduct a synthesis analysis to explore the benefits and challenges of blockchain technology in the food industry. We demonstrate that blockchain enables unprecedented visibility at each step of the food supply chain, helps increase transaction transparency, food safety, and quality, and also reduces food fraud and waste. Furthermore, it serves as a digital solution for reducing operational costs and improving efficiency in food supply chains.
The blockchain is essentially a shared database, and the data stored is unforgeable, open and transparent, which may allow the retailers adopting the blockchain technology to attract more consumers by making product information more transparent, while it also leads to the risk of consumers privacy leakage due to storing the corresponding consumers’ personal information. In order to study the impact of blockchain technology on competitive retailers’ strategic pricing, we establish a retailer competition model including an initial retailer and an entrant retailer both of whom can decide whether to apply the blockchain technology. We obtain the optimal prices and corresponding profits of the two retailers when applying and not applying blockchain, respectively, and find that consumer privacy concerns decline both retailers’ prices and profits when adopting blockchain technology because consumer privacy concerns lower consumers’ valuations of products, thereby reducing demand. Furthermore, we analyze the two retailers’ equilibrium strategies of the application of blockchain technology, which suggest that it is not always beneficial for retailers to adopt blockchain technology in all situations. Both retailers will apply blockchain only when consumer privacy concerns are lower and information transparency promotion is higher because higher information transparency promotion increases consumers’ willingness to pay, which exceeds the cost of consumers privacy concerns. On the contrary, when consumer privacy concerns are higher and information transparency promotion is lower, neither retailer will apply blockchain technology. Interestingly, when both consumer privacy concerns and information transparency promotion are medium, the initial retail will apply blockchain technology and the entrant retailer will not because consumers’ higher trust in initial retailers allows the initial retailer can bear higher cost of consumers privacy concerns which is hard to undertake for the new entrant retailer when information transparency promotion is medium.
Maritime ports are an integral part of global trade and the supply network system. An upcoming paradigm for innovation in this system is that of the Physical Internet (PI). This highly advanced way of shipping will present a very different logistics environment with respective challenges for maritime ports. For those investing in or operating port systems, it is important to understand whether different service quality aspects will be important in this future system, compared to today. Our paper deals with the port selection problem. Although it has been studied extensively in a contemporary context, there has been no exploration of the criteria and preferences of decision-makers in the future shipping environment of the PI. Our objective is to define these criteria and explore their weighting in this new context. We propose two distinct autonomous decision-makers for port performance evaluation and selection in the PI: intelligent containers and vessels. We identify future port performance evaluation and selection criteria, and analyse their weighting based on an expert survey, complementing the extant literature on port selection and the PI. We use the Bayesian Best-Worst Method (BWM) to derive weights for the criteria. We find that, compared to the current port performance evaluation and selection literature, in a first stage in the modelling of intelligent agents’ performance preferences, subtle differences in weights mark the step from the present towards the PI. Partly, this is reassuring for port authorities as they can manage largely the same set of performance indicators to be attractive for both decision-makers. However, the results also show differences between agents, with an increased importance of, in particular, Level of Service, Network Interconnectivity, and Information Systems.
Although the application of blockchain technology in maritime industry can improve the customs clearance efficiency and logistics transparency in the container cargo supply chains, it generates the unit operations cost and setup cost. In this study, a spatial model is proposed to conduct an investigation into the two heterogeneous ports when blockchain technology is applied under inter-port competition. Different utility-driven operations models are built to highlight the values of blockchain technology for port logistics capability, and to reveal the equilibria under the optimal strategies and equilibrium strategies. It is noticed that the relationship between the unit net benefit and unit operations cost brought out by blockchain technology is a key factor determining whether the blockchain technology is applicable. When the unit operations cost is lower than unit net benefit, and the setup cost is high, there is a win-win situation for two ports to apply traditional technology. It is further verified to be Pareto-optimal. In addition, three lose-lose situations are also identified, which are classic Prisoner's Dilemmas. Consequently, a horizontal collaboration mechanism "blockchain technology sharing + compensation" (BTSC) is designed to not only break these three Prisoner's Dilemmas, but also achieve the Pareto-optimum. Furthermore, we discuss some extensions to prove the robustness of our main qualitative insights.
Traceability which is a tracking capability used to identify the sources of many quality problems, such as product recall, has become an important feature of supply chains. In this paper, we develop a game-theoretical model to study the interactions of supply chain traceability and product reliability optimization in a competitive supply chain with product recall. Specifically, we consider two competing manufacturers that may choose to invest in traceability on the basis of product reliability optimization, by using the Non-track, Mono-track, and Duo-track models, and then sell products through two competing retailers to customers who are concerned with the differentiation of the product, the channel, and the traceability. We derive the optimal traceability and product reliability strategies of the three tracking models with endogenous pricing, and demonstrate the equilibrium tracking strategies for two competing manufacturers. The results show that traceability can fully substitute product reliability when the traceability investment cost coefficient is low but it may improve product reliability when the cost coefficient is high and the reliability investment cost coefficient is low. Investing in traceability will always benefit the manufacturer itself, and may benefit the competitor who does not track when the traceability investment cost coefficient is large enough. Interestingly, we find that the profit of the manufacturer who invests in traceability is increasing in the traceability competition intensity.
The study investigates how the adoption of emerging digital technologies can provide valuable business opportunities for logistics centres in maritime supply chains. For this purpose, a systematic literature review (SLR) of prior academic studies addressing this topic is performed. The review unveils the current lack of a comprehensive framework to assess the impact of digital technologies on transport and maritime logistics, bringing insights for a promising research agenda. The paper proposes an ad-hoc conceptual framework for disentangling relevant business opportunities which originates from the adoption of cutting-edge digital technologies for each type of logistics centres. The main business benefits for logistics infrastructures which manage cargo flows in maritime supply chains (MSCs) are identified and discussed. The results suggest alternative strategic options for innovating logistics chains and increase the competitiveness of various cargo logistics centres. Managerial and marketing implications for both academics and practitioners are discussed in-depth.
We develop a theory that shows signaling a firm’s fundamental quality (e.g., its operational capabilities) to lenders through inventory transactions to be more efficient—it leads to less costly operational distortions—than signaling through loan requests, and we characterize how the efficiency gains depend on firm operational characteristics, such as operating costs, market size, and inventory salvage value. Signaling through inventory being only tenable when inventory transactions are verifiable at low enough cost, we then turn our attention to how this verifiability can be achieved in practice and argue that blockchain technology could enable it more efficiently than traditional monitoring mechanisms. To demonstrate, we develop b_verify, an open-source blockchain protocol that leverages Bitcoin to provide supply chain transparency at scale and in a cost-effective way. The paper identifies an important benefit of blockchain adoption—by opening a window of transparency into a firm’s supply chain, blockchain technology furnishes the ability to secure favorable financing terms at lower signaling costs. Furthermore, the analysis of the preferred signaling mode sheds light on what types of firms or supply chains would stand to benefit the most from this use of blockchain technology.
This paper was accepted by Victor Martínez-de-Albéniz, operations management.
The behavioural intention to adopt Blockchain for supply chain management (BCSCM) is studied in this paper. The research framework adopted considers how Performance Expectancy (PE), Effort Expectancy (EE), Facilitating Condition (FC), Technology Readiness (TR), Technology Affinity (TA) and Trust (TT) can lead to the adoption of the technology. Data gathered from 157 firms is analysed using SPSS version 2 while the quality of the measurement is tested using WarpPLS. Findings revealed that FC, TR and TA have a positive influence on intention to use BCSCM and regulatory support moderates the effect of FC. This study offers valuable insights into the applicability of Blockchain technology for supply chain management.
On-demand service platforms are popular nowadays. Many platforms hire agents to serve customers who are risk sensitive towards the waiting-time. In this paper, we apply the mean-risk theory to analytically explore how the risk attitude of customers affects the optimal service pricing decision of the on-demand platform, consumer surplus (CS) of customers, the expected profit (EP) and profit risk (PR) of the platform (and the hired service agents). In the basic model, assuming consumers are homogeneous, we find that if the customers are more risk averse (risk seeking), the optimal service price will drop (increase). Comparing among the three different risk attitudes of customers, we find that when the customers are risk seeking, the CS and the platform's EP are highest, even though the platform's PR is also highest. While the opposite happens when the customers are risk averse. In the extended model with a market including customers with different risk attitudes, the blockchain technology helps the platform assess the proportion of risk seeking, risk neutral and risk averse customers accurately. We explore the optimal service prices under both the common pricing policy and the customized pricing policy (with-respect-to customer's risk attitude), and derive the value of blockchain technology mediated customized service pricing strategy. We conclude by highlighting that the risk attitudes of customers play a critical role in determining the optimal on-demand service pricing, and the blockchain technology is a valuable technological tool to help.
Although a number of studies focus on using the blockchain technology (BT) in various application aspects, there is no comprehensive survey on the blockchain applications in maritime shipping supply chain. To fill this gap, we conduct a comprehensive blockchain applications and future improvements survey, and empirically evaluate its effects on intention to use. The results suggested that customs clearance and management, digitalizing and easing paperwork, standardization and platform development dimensions positively affected intention to use. In particular, this paper gives the maritime shipping blockchain-based digitalization also points out the future improvement directions in the blockchain technology.
In emerging markets, there are data quality problems. In this paper, we establish theoretical models to explore how data quality problems affect sustainable fashion supply chain operations. We start with the decentralized supply chain and find that poor data quality lowers supply chain profit and social welfare. We consider the implementation of blockchain to help and identify the situation in which blockchain helps enhance social welfare but brings harm to supply chain profitability. We propose a government sponsor scheme as well as the environment taxation waiving scheme to help. We further extend the study to the centralized supply chain setting.
This paper presents current academic and industrial frontiers on blockchain application in supply chain, logistics and transport management. We conduct a systematic review of the literature and find four main clusters in the co-citation analysis, namely Technology, Trust, Trade, and Traceability/Transparency. For each cluster, and based on the pool of articles included in it, we apply an inductive method of reasoning and discuss the emerging themes and applications of blockchains for supply chains, logistics and transport. We conclude by discussing the main themes for future research on blockchain technology and its application in industry and services.
This paper presents current academic and industrial frontiers on blockchain application in supply chain, logistics and transport management. We conduct a systematic review of the literature and find four main clusters in the co-citation analysis, namely Technology, Trust, Trade, and Traceability/Transparency. For each cluster, and based on the pool of articles included in it, we apply an inductive method of reasoning and discuss the emerging themes and applications of blockchains for supply chains, logistics and transport. We conclude by discussing the main themes for future research on blockchain technology and its application in industry and services.
The blockchain technology is very useful in many industries. One current application is on diamond authentication and certification, which is important in many luxury supply chains. In this paper, we explore different consumer utility driven operations models and highlight the values of blockchain technology supported (BTS) platforms for diamond authentication and certification. We build models and analytically examine both the traditional retail network operations (Model R) and the BTS selling platform (Model PL). We further extend the analysis to study the case with the BTS certification platform (Model BCR). We reveal the conditions under which one model outperforms the others. In particular, we note that the shopping convenience utility offered by the traditional retailers is a critical factor determining which model is the best. Finally, for the BTS platform operations, we study the blockchain-technology-based diamond authentication and certification (BDAC) cost and reveal that reducing it is beneficial to all parties in the luxury supply chain.
The complexity of port terminal operations and intermodal transshipments has pushed the introduction of information and communication technologies (ICT) to assist the multiple stakeholders involved in the multiple decision-making processes. More recently the development of systems based on the Internet of Things (IoT) represents a further step in the automation of data acquisition and processing. We present here an IoT system designed to optimize, manage and monitor container transport operations along an intermodal corridor, combining rail scheduling and inland vessel navigation. The system has a modular design, enabling the interaction with external systems, independently of their nature, through the cloud-based FIWARE platform. We provide a description of the three inter-related subsystems (container tracking, rail management and inland navigation), and a description of the expected supply chain benefits derived from the implementation of the system, both in terms of shippers and of terminal integration in the logistics flow. This system is currently operative at the Port of Seville, the main transshipment node in the Madrid – Seville – Canary Islands intermodal corridor in Spain.