Topic: Balancing Supply with Demand in Ride-hailing Platforms Using An Operational Approach
Speaker: ZHOU Qin, PhD candidate in HKU Business School
Host: LI Feng, Associate Professor, Department of Production Operation and Logistics Management, School of Management of HUST
Time and Date: 08:30a.m.-10:00a.m., Nov. 25, 2021
Location: Classroom 121, School of Management
Ride-hailing platforms are concerned about supply-demand imbalance, as during peak periods, demand from passengers far exceeds supply from drivers, whereas during off-peak periods, the supply is plenty but the demand is weak. It is heavily criticized for exploiting passengers and hurting drivers' rating scores. We propose two novel operational schemes for shifting the supply during off-peak periods to meet the demand during peak periods. We show that both schemes increase the transaction volume. If adopting an open system where part-time drivers can provide service, a platform prefers the prioritization scheme. For platforms that solely rely on full-time drivers, the qualification scheme is better. Our results have general implications for on-demand platforms (e.g., food delivery platforms and freelance platforms) in resolving the challenge of supply-demand mismatch.
Speaker Profile:
Qin Zhou is a PhD candidate in operations management in the Faculty of Business and Economics (HKU Business School) at the University of Hong Kong. Her research interests lie in supply chain management, platform operations, and empirical operations. She has papers accepted by Naval Research Logistics, European Journal of Operational Research, and under revision at Management Science. Qin received her Bachelor’s degree in electronic commerce from Wuhan University.
