The present study provides a theoretical investigation on pioneering advantage based on reference dependence and loss aversion effect under prospect theory (Kahneman and Tversky, 1979). Behavioral explanations for pioneering advantage are provided from two different perspectives: one based on the prototypicality and the other on the utility uncertainty of the option. A pioneer brand creates the product category and makes a strong impression in customers' mind, and thus becomes the most representative or prototypical option of the category. In addition, the pioneer brand becomes the first option to be experienced by the majority of consumers in the product category, thus has the lowest level of utility uncertainty compared with the late movers. This study integrates the previous accounts for pioneering advantage by showing that consumers have higher preferences for the most prototypical and the least uncertain option based on loss aversion and reference dependence effect. This study suggests that firms should carefully analyze the consumers' loss aversion and perceived uncertainty and prototypicality of their products in order to develop effective market entry strategies.

Tuning the architecture of SVM (support vector machine) is to build an SVM model of better performance. Two different tuning methods of the grid search and the GA (genetic algorithm) have been addressed in the literature, each of which has its own methodological pros and cons. This paper suggests a combined method for tuning the architecture of SVM models, which employs the GAM (generalized additive models), the grid search, and the GA in sequence. The GAM is used for selecting input variables, and the grid search and the GA are employed for finding optimal parameter values of the SVM models. Applying the method to a bankruptcy prediction problem, we show that SVM model tuned by the proposed method outperforms other SVM models.

The aim of this paper is to consider the process of supplying trained workers with knowledge and skills for upcoming business opportunities and the process of training apprentices to be prepared to meet future demands in an IT service firm. As the demand for new workers fluctuates, a firm should employ a buffer workforce such as apprentices or interns. However, as a result of rapid business development, the capacity of the buffer may be exceeded, thus requiring the company to recruit skilled workers from outside the firm. Therefore, it is important for a firm to map out a strategy for manpower planning so as to fulfill the demands of new business and minimize the operation costs related to training apprentices and recruiting experienced workers. First, this paper analyzes the supply and demand of workers for the IT service in a knowledge-intensive field. It then presents optimal human resource planning strategies via the familiar method of stochastic process. Also, we illustrate that our model is applied to the human resource planning of an information security service firm in South Korea.

In the continuous review (Q, r) model one continuously monitors inventory level and places a replenishment order when the inventory position reaches the reorder point. In many business practices, however, inventory decreases in a discrete fashion. As a result, replenishment orders are usually placed after the inventory position gets far below the reorder point. This makes a chance of shortage more likely and the service level lower than designed. Such a discrepancy can be compensated for by raising the reorder point to some extent. The question is how much the reorder point should be raised in order to compensate for a potential shortage. In this study, we present experimental analyses for this question. Regression models are also proposed for on-site use.

Team orienteering, an extension of single-competitor orienteering, is the problem of determining multiple paths from a starting node to a finishing node for a given allowed time or distance limit fixed for each of the paths with the objective of maximizing the total collected score. Each path is through a subset of nodes, each of which has an associated score. The team orienteering problem has many applications such as home fuel delivery, college football players recruiting, service technicians scheduling, military operations, etc. Unlike existing optimal and heuristic algorithms often leading to heavy computation, this paper suggests two types of priority rule based heuristics-serial and parallel ones-that are especially suitable for practically large-sized problems. In the proposed heuristics, all nodes are listed in an order using a priority rule and then the paths are constructed according to this order. To show the performances of the heuristics, computational experiments were done on the small-to-medium sized benchmark instances and randomly generated large sized test instances, and the results show that some of the heuristics give reasonable quality solutions within very short computation time.

This paper considers a flowshop scheduling problem where a customer orders multiple products (jobs) from a production facility. The objectives are to minimize makespan and to minimize the sum of order (batch) completion times. The order cannot be shipped unless all the products in the order are manufactured. This problem was motivated by numerous real world problems encountered by a variety of manufacturers. For the makespan objective, we develop an optimal solution procedure which runs in polynomial time. For the sum of order completion time objective, we establish the complexity of the problem including several special cases. Then, we introduce a simple heuristic and find an asymptotically tight worst case bound on relative error. Finally, we conclude the paper with some implications.