1. Introduction
In recent years, the trend for the development of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) has increased dramatically. One of the fundamental solutions that has been considered in scientific circles for organizing SMEs is the aggregation of these firms and their organization in the form of networks. In other words, by merging companies that operate in similar or related fields, it may be possible to benefit from synergy effects, modernization and increasing its competitiveness, attracting foreign investment and novel technologies. However, the remarkable point is that many of the new possibilities and advantages for those who take part in such co-operations are derived from synergy effects 1. In this new era, presence and activity in networks has become vital for organizations, as co-operation by sharing resources leads to an increase in the capacity of organizations and this, in turn, boosts the ability of organizations to achieve common objectives and interests. Therefore, operation of organizations and companies in the framework of networked businesses is an important factor in meeting market demands 2. The numerous benefits of presence and activity within networks have led organizations to set up network businesses and we are now witnessing the birth and growth of specialized and public networks in various industries and business domains.
The increase of expenses in the diagnostic services sector and the inability of patients to pay for lab services lead to increased pressure on the government to finance health services. In such a situation, laboratories have no competitive advantage and need fundamental changes. Laboratories should significantly lower their expenses and manage their resources in an efficient way. Therefore, the cooperation of laboratories within the framework of a network provides the possibility of lowering the costs (constant and variable), more efficient use of resources in order to offer optimal services, creating competitive advantage for the members of the lab network, and consequently an increase in the income for the whole network and thus for individual labs. Nowadays, efforts have been made to convert laboratory structures into networks, and in this paper two examples of laboratories that have benefited from a network approach are Quest and Dr. Lal. Quest, which is based in the US and has 2200 branches, is ranked as one of the top companies by Fortune and is ranked in the top 12 companies offering laboratory services 3. The lab network Dr. Lal, a unified lab network with a reference lab in Delhi, has over 190 diagnosis labs in 2017 4. From the standpoint of operational capacity in 2015, the network has gathered and processed 21.8 million samples from 7.7 million patients, which is a key advantage for Dr. Lal among its rivals 5.
The variety in laboratory types makes the profitability and allocation of their resources to face the several challenges that impact the sustainability of the laboratory and ultimately, the provision of services. Currently, one of the challenges facing diagnostic networks is to achieve a collaborative network that allocates fair profit among network members. As such, all members expect to receive a fair share of the profits. Therefore, the mechanism of distribution of profits should be based upon the principle of equality. Each member should be aware that the profit they receive is determined by the amount of their contribution. In cooperation networks made up of various players, profit distribution in the network is often based on factors that build the common infrastructure. An understanding of the factors effecting profit distribution leads to the growth of the network and increasing opportunities for benefit and share-holder satisfaction of network policies. Therefore, the prognosis labs network must identify the factors that are necessary to produce a common infrastructure up to the growth stage. With a fair approach to profit distribution, the profit assigned to each lab unit within the network is determined by the amount of cooperation and contribution made by that member.
Inequality in profit distribution has caused some networks to disintegrate. Thus, the fair, objective, and effective distribution of profits is a growing concern for managers. It has been established by numerous studies that profit distribution is in the interests of partners. Therefore, to the best of our knowledge, modern game theory is the best option to address this concern. In cooperative games, we need a solution concept that gives rise to a unique outcome. This endows our model with predictive power 6. One way of looking for a unique solution is Shapely value 7 that makes sure that a fair distribution of benefits will be achieved in accordance with the contribution of each member, thus encouraging the old-time maxims of hard work and equality.
This paper presents a game theory model called the Shapley Value Model to distribute profits among members of the medical diagnostic labs network. For this purpose, first, the network members are determined by k-means clustering algorithm as one of the most important and most used algorithms in literature. Then, the proposed profit-sharing model calculates the profit of each laboratory and provides decision makers with more reliable information on the profit share of each member of the network.
The remainder of the paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, the research method is explained. Then, in Section 3, a case study is described. In Section 3, first, how to select the network members is described, and then a proposed approach is used to divide the profits among the members of the network. Finally, the analysis of the results is discussed. Section 4, concludes the paper and introduce some future research suggestions.