Enabling roles of integration and resilience for sustainable supply Chain performance: an empirical study on China’s E-commerce platforms

Abstract

ABSTRACT With the rapid expansion of platform-oriented business models, the sustainability of e-commerce platforms which integrate and match the upstream supplies and downstream demands has become increasingly important. This paper studies the enabling roles of integration and resilience on sustainable supply chain performance (SSCP) of e-commerce platforms in China. A comprehensive survey for supply chain professionals from various e-commerce platforms is conducted, and 227 valid responses are obtained. Based on the structural equation modelling (SEM) approach, the findings suggest that: (1) supplier integration (SI), internal integration (II) and customer integration (CI) all actively promote supply chain resilience (SCR); (2) supplier integration (SI) and internal integration (II) directly promote SSCP, and customer integration (CI) hardly directly affect SSCP. However, II mediates the relationship between SI, CI and SSCP, and the positive role of CI on SSCP can be achieved through the mediating effect of II; (3) SCR directly promotes SSCP, while it also mediates the association among SSCI and SSCP. The results provide insights on how to differentiate the impacts of SI, CI, II and the role of SCR on SSCP.