Title: Location and pricing of competitive service providers for post-disaster relief

Authors: Fan Xiao; Jing-Xian Zhou; Zhi-Hua Hu

Addresses: College of Information Engineering, Shanghai Maritime University, Shanghai 201306, China ' Logistics Research Center, Shanghai Maritime University, Shanghai 201306, China ' Logistics Research Center, Shanghai Maritime University, Shanghai 201306, China

Abstract: In post-disaster relief, competitive emergency service providers place their stations quickly for timely rescue activities. To shorten the rescue time of the emergency services and ensure the profit of emergency service providers, an extended game model is formulated to solve the problem based on the classical Hotelling model. In the new model, logistics cost is paid by service providers who can obtain honour profit through providing service for the victims. The victims endure waiting times that consist of periods of response time and travelling time. The waiting times affect the victims' decisions and affect the equilibrium prices and profits. Numerical analysis implies that service providers obtain the highest profits on their equilibrium price when their locations are decided. Furthermore, locating both players near the ends of the disaster-affected line city is beneficial to increase the gross profits.

Keywords: emergency logistics; emergency services; Hotelling model; competitive location; logistics management; pricing; post-disaster relief; emergency management; disaster relief; waiting times; response time; travel time; emergency response; game theory.

DOI: 10.1504/IJISE.2017.080686

International Journal of Industrial and Systems Engineering, 2017 Vol.25 No.1, pp.14 - 34

Received: 08 Dec 2014
Accepted: 01 Feb 2015
Published online: 04 Dec 2016 *

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