A study on the effects of rolling forecast with different information sharing models on supply chain performance

Manufacturers usually apply rolling forecast for dealing with customers' requirement of squeezed delivery time. Rolling forecast is generally used in two-level supply chain. We wonder whether the advantage of rolling forecast is still exist when rolling forecast is utilized in three-level supply chain. This study builds three scenarios with different procedures of information sharing derived from information enriched supply chain and considers forecast frozen periods and lead time as moderating factors. This study would like to investigate the influence of rolling forecast with different information sharing models on supply chain performance under variant moderators by employing simulation-based methodology. Results reveal that the impact of different information sharing scenarios is greater for upstream companies than downstream companies in supply chains. Results also show that variant forecast frozen periods and lead time influence the relationship of different information sharing models and supply chain performance. Hence, the visibility of the supply chain, which could be improved by transmitting ordering information from customers to all supply chain partners, is critical to overall performance.