THESIS
2020
xi, 83 pages : illustrations ; 30 cm
Abstract
This thesis studies two operational management problems on common online platforms.
We first consider a creative crowdsourcing platform that provides on-demand creative
work such as design, editing and even programming. Typically, a client submits a project
requirement together with a budget to the platform, and the platform posts the project
information to individual service providers for them to focus on. To ensure the service
ability over time, we construct a stochastic sequential allocation model where the platform
controls the maximum number of participants for each project. Our results show that
under mild conditions the optimal policy follows an inverted-U shape, and the platform
can take advantage of the market volatility to judiciously gain more revenue. The work
also...[
Read more ]
This thesis studies two operational management problems on common online platforms.
We first consider a creative crowdsourcing platform that provides on-demand creative
work such as design, editing and even programming. Typically, a client submits a project
requirement together with a budget to the platform, and the platform posts the project
information to individual service providers for them to focus on. To ensure the service
ability over time, we construct a stochastic sequential allocation model where the platform
controls the maximum number of participants for each project. Our results show that
under mild conditions the optimal policy follows an inverted-U shape, and the platform
can take advantage of the market volatility to judiciously gain more revenue. The work
also contributes to some the strategic level decisions. In particular, a platform can pursue
market share expansion with marginal revenue loss when there are ample resources; and
merging can bring in materialized benefits only when two platforms are suitably different
in terms of the resource and demand ratio.
We then study the presale competition on common e-commerce platforms, where
it serves as a preheating tool for platform-level sales events. Such presale promotion
offers a pre-ordering option with a discounted price, and is committed by paying a nonrefundable
deposit. We consider a two-period model, where consumers arrive in both
periods and decide to pre-order in the first period with uncertain values, or to purchase
in the spot period after their uncertainty is resolved. We analyze the effects of presale on
competing sellers in an asymmetric market. Our results show that a seller's equilibrium
choice is to prevent their pre-ordered consumers from leaving their market, instead of making profits on the non-refundable part. Under common assumptions presale is able
to benefit competing sellers by taking advantage of consumers' uncertainty, and mitigates
the competitive advantage of the seller with higher popularity level and reduce the profit
gap between the two sellers.
Post a Comment