This site covers decision problems related to inventory management. In
contrast to other decision problems resulting in the building up of stock, such
as lotsizing decisions, inventory management is primarily about specifying the
size and placement of safety stocks.
These are required at different
locations and in many nodes of a supply network to protect the regular and
planned course of value-added processes against random disturbances occuring with respect to the demand as well as the replenishment lead time. In most companies the correct application of up-to-date inventory management methods will unleash significant potential of cost savings.
Most of these methods with proven applicability in industrial practice are illustrated in detail in the following textbook:
Tempelmeier, H. (2006). Inventory-Management in Supply Networks – Problems, Models, Solutions. Norderstedt: Books on Demand. Hardcover; 312 pages; ISBN 3833453737
The book discusses methods for safety stock control in single-stage and multi-stage inventory models and provides readily implementable numerical algorithms to solve practical problems. Spreadsheet implementations and many numerical examples are also given. Sample keywords are "backorders, bullwhip effect, customer classes, fill rate, (s,q), (r,S), (s,S), lead time, MRP, newsvendor, pooling, ready rate, safety stock, safety lead time, service level, waiting time", among others.
