The use of game theory in the analysis of marine lubricant markets in ports
Document Type
Article
Year
2022
Authors
D. Tsakona, A. Kokossis
Source
Computer Aided Chemical Engineering, Volume 51, pp.1351-1356, 2022
Keywords
marine lubricants; multinational companies; local suppliers; game theory; bilevel approach
Abstract
The supply of marine lubricants to vessels can be arranged by multinational companies (majors) or local suppliers (locals) who have interactions and contract agreements between them. The challenge of the paper has been to use game theory to analyze the market share that is attributed to each supplier and who it is connected to the level of interactions, the market constraints and how they can affect the overall profitability for each player. The paper presents the framework of players interactions that it formulates as a bilevel optimization problem with major (leader) and local players (followers) assigned to the outer and inner problems. The model is used to assess threats and promises. The bilevel approach can be used to calculate parameter sensitivity and key aspects to retain market balance and profit share. The approach has been validated with real data in which the analysis achieved to predict the actual market and profit share using the model-based approach. Model extensions subsequently test parameters responsible for system stability and player options that address threatening moves from other players.
