ORDER-VOLUME DETERMINATION DEVICE, ORDER-VOLUME DETERMINATION METHOD, RECORDING MEDIUM, AND ORDER-VOLUME DETERMINATION SYSTEM

摘要

This invention discloses an order-volume determination device that determines an appropriate order volume. A component determination unit (91) determines a component to use in a shipment-volume prediction on the basis of the following: a hierarchical hidden structure in which hidden variables are represented by a tree structure and components representing probability models are assigned to the nodes at the lowest level of said tree structure; a gate function that determines the direction in which to branch at each node of the aforementioned hierarchical hidden structure; and prediction data. On the basis of the determined component and the prediction data, a shipment-volume prediction unit (92) computes a predicted shipment volume for a product between the present time and a second point in time that is after a first point in time. An order-volume determination unit determines (93) an order volume for said product by adding or subtracting an amount corresponding to the prediction-error spread of the determined component to or from an amount obtained by subtracting, from the predicted shipment volume for the product between the present time and the abovementioned second point in time, the current inventory of the product and the amount of the product that will be received between the present time and the abovementioned first point in time.