Coordination of a platform-based supply chain in the marketplace or reselling mode considering cross-channel effect and blockchain technology

Abstract

We consider a supply chain consisting of a manufacturer and an online platform. The manufacturer produces products under the carbon cap-and-trade policy, and sells them through its own offline channel and the platform, which operates in either the marketplace or reselling mode. While enlarging the potential retail market size through the “platform power”, the platform provides logistics service for the online sales. We also consider the cross-channel effect concerning the impact of online sales on offline demand. The manufacturer can adopt blockchain technology to improve demand forecasting. We study the optimal production, pricing, delivery time decisions, and the coordination problem of the two firms under various scenarios. We compare the optimal decisions of the two firms and the manufacturer's profits with and without blockchain in each operation mode of the platform. We find that the cross-channel effect and blockchain have significant impacts on the optimal decisions and coordination results. In the marketplace mode, the optimal production quantity increases (decreases) with the commission rate if the cross-channel effect is high (low). The optimal delivery time increases (decreases) with the cross-channel effect and the cap in the marketplace (reselling) mode. The reselling mode can coordinate the manufacturer and platform regardless of whether delivery time or strategic inventory is considered, while the marketplace mode can coordinate the two firms only when delivery time is considered. If the cross-channel effect is low (high) and the platform power is high (low), adopting blockchain can generate more profit for the manufacturer. Furthermore, adopting blockchain promotes the coordination of the manufacturer and the platform.