Methods of vendor managed inventory control in supply chain management

摘要

By inducing the typical inventory control problem―the bullwhip effect, this paper presents vendor managed inventory (VMI) control methods on the basis of traditional methods of inventory management methods, constructs a VMI mathematics model, and analyzes the influence of VMI on inventory cost and channel profit. Finally, a special case is studied to verify that VMI is an effective supply chain strategy that can not only increase channel profit of supplier and customer but also improve full channel coordination, thereby reducing the bullwhip effect.