2015 Informs Annual Meeting

SC40

INFORMS Philadelphia – 2015

SC41 41-Room 102A, CC Joint Session MSOM-Health/HAS/Practice: Operations Management of Emergency Services II Sponsor: Manufacturing & Service Oper Mgmt/ Healthcare & HAS Operations Sponsored Session Chair: Shane Henderson, Professor, Cornell University, Rhodes Hall, Ithaca, NY, 14853, United States of America, sgh9@cornell.edu 1 - The Minimum Expected Penalty Relocation Problem for the Computation of Ambulance Compliance Tables Thije Van Barneveld, PhD-student, Centrum Wiskunde en Informatica, Science Park 123, Amsterdam, Netherlands, t.c.van.barneveld@vu.nl We study the ambulance relocation problem in which one tries to retain the ability to respond to possible future incidents quickly. For this purpose, we consider compliance table policies. To compute efficient compliance tables, we introduce the Minimum Expected Penalty Relocation Problem (MEXPREP), in which one has the ability to control the number of waiting site relocations. Moreover, different performance measures related to response times, e.g., survival probabilities, can be incorporated. 2 - Optimizing Aircraft Configuration for Air-ambulance Service Provider in Ontario Pieter Van Den Berg, Delft University of Technology, Mekelweg 4, Delft, 2628 CD, Netherlands, P.L.vandenBerg@tudelft.nl, Shane Henderson, Karen Aardal Ornge provides air-ambulance services to patients in the province of Ontario. For this service, both fixed wing aircraft and helicopters are used. The fixed wing aircraft have a wider range but are restricted to land on airports. Helicopters, on the other hand, are more flexible in landing sites. Currently, Ornge operates a 24/7 flat schedule. We apply both simulation and optimization techniques to find good configurations of the aircraft and helicopters for both day and night. 3 - Optimality of the Closest-idle Policy in Advanced Ambulance Dispatching Sandjai Bhulai, VU University Amsterdam, De Boelelaan 1081a, Amsterdam, 1081 HV, Netherlands, s.bhulai@vu.nl, Caroline Jagtenberg, Rob Van Der Mei In ambulance dispatching it is commonly believed that the ‘closest idle ambulance’ rule is the best choice. We present two alternatives to this classical rule and show that significant improvements can be obtained. The first alternative is based on a Markov decision problem, and the second is a heuristic that can handle regions with large numbers of ambulances. The heuristic reduces the fraction of late arrivals by 18% for a large emergency medical services region in the Netherlands. 4 - An Information-based Bound on the Performance of Ambulance Redeployment Policies Kenneth Chong, PhD Student, Cornell University, 257 Rhodes Hall, Ithaca, NY, 14853, United States of America, kcc66@cornell.edu, Shane Henderson, Mark Lewis, Huseyin Topaloglu Ambulance redeployment is the practice of strategically relocating idle ambulances in real time to improve coverage of future demand. We present an upper bound on the performance that can be attained by any redeployment policy. Our approach involves formulating the redeployment problem as a stochastic dynamic program, considering an information relaxation of this problem, and penalizing policies that violate nonanticipativity constraints.

2 - Managing Sales of a New Product Though Competing Brokers Rahul Bhaskar, Professor, California State University, Fullerton, 800 north college boulevard, fullerton, ca, 92834, United States of America, rbhaskar@fullerton.edu, Vahideh Abedi A new product typically rely on sales efforts of brokers to enhance sales. Customers make their purchase decision not only based on the word of mouth they have received from other customers about the product, but also based on the collective information received from the brokers. Therefore, brokers act synergistically to generate sales while competing. We develop an analytical framework for this sales process and show how it can facilitate important managerial decision making. 3 - Simultaneous vs. Sequential Crowdsourcing Contests Lu Wang, Rotman School of Management, 105 St. George Street, Toronto, Canada, Lu.Wang12@Rotman.Utoronto.CA, Ming Hu In a crowdsourcing contest, innovation is outsourced from an open crowd. We consider two alternative mechanisms for an innovative product involving multiple attributes. One is to run a simultaneous contest, where the best solution is selected from the single solution simultaneously submitted by each contestant. The other is to run multiple sequential sub-contests, with each dedicated to one attribute. While both mechanisms have their own advantages, either could win over depending on parameters. 4 - To Tier or Not to Tier: A Comparative Analysis of Different Loyalty Program Structures Amir Gandomi, Assistant Professor, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, ON, M5B 2K3, Canada, agandomi@ryerson.ca, Amirhossein Bazargan, Saeed Zolfaghari This study analyzes the effectiveness of two common loyalty program structures, namely, linear and multi-tier structures. Using a game theoretic approach, we formulate the market conditions under which different structures are more profitable. Market conditions are characterized by the proportion of members who are active and the degree to which they are forward-looking. The binary logit model is used to capture the customers’ buying behavior in a multiple-period setting. SC40 40- Room 101, CC Behavioral Operations I Contributed Session Chair: Bo Hu, Research Staff, Xerox Corp, 800 Phillips Road, Webster, NY, 14580, United States of America, bo.hu@xerox.com 1 - Bidding Decision in Land Auction using Prospect Theory Xinwang Liu, Professor, Southeast University, Si Pai Lou 2, Nanjing, 210096, China, xwliu@seu.edu.cn With the background of land auction practice in China, we consider the preferences of the decision-makers in land bidding decisions with the multi- attribute additive utility and reference point in cumulative prospect theory. Three land auction models are proposed based on the appearance time of the land auctions: the simultaneous model, the time sequential model and the event sequential model. A case study illustrates the processes and results of our approaches. 2 - Decision Behavior in Humanitarian Logistics – The Effect of Stress on Operational Decisions Maximilian Burkhardt, PhD Candidate, WHU Otto Beisheim School of Management, Burgplatz 2, Vallendar, Germany, maximilian.burkhardt@whu.edu, Stefan Spinler We examine the influence of cognitive biases under stress in disaster relief situations. Although the effect of various biases in operational decisions has been analyzed, the specific effect of stress on decision behavior has been out of focus. Time pressure and high-stakes involved serve as relevant stressors in this context. For the required empirical support we aim at conducting experiments with different subject groups, such as business students and humanitarian practitioners. 3 - Apply Behavioral Economics in Designing Services Bo Hu, Research Staff, Xerox Corp, 800 Phillips Road, Webster, NY, 14580, United States of America, bo.hu@xerox.com, Yu An Sun, Julien Bourdaillet We use data to find biases in choosing voluntary benefit packages. Behavioral experiments are designed to tests hypothesis in correct those biases.

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