The influence of leadership and smart level on the strategy choice of the smart logistics platform: a perspective of collaborative innovation participation

Abstract

In a two-tier supply chain consisting of a smart logistics platform and a smart logistics provider, for value-added service innovation in logistics, there are usually two innovation modes: collaborative innovation (CI) in the supply chain and independent innovation by the provider. In this study, we research the strategic choice of the platform about whether to co-innovate with the provider when the platform requires the provider to innovate new value-added services. By building a two-tier supply chain game model, this study focuses on the influence of leadership and smart level on the platform's CI strategy. This study obtains many interesting findings. Firstly, we give the cost thresholds for the platform to choose CI under different relationships, with higher thresholds under the provider-led relationship compared to Nash and platform-led relationships, the platform is most likely to choose CI under the provider-led relationship, while most difficult to choose under Nash relationship. Secondly, we find that under Nash and platform-led relationships, the platform's participation in the CI will lead to an increase in both parties' profits, so that the CI can be achieved, but under the provider-led relationship, there may be a situation where the platform's profits increase and the provider’s profits decrease when the two parties co-innovate, and since under this relationship it is easiest for the platform to choose to participate in the CI, the platform can choose a cost-sharing contract to solve this problem and achieve CI. Thirdly, with the same leadership, the higher the smart level of the provider is, the more incentive the platform is to participate in CI. If the smart level of the provider is very low or the smart level of the platform is very high, the platform will never participate in CI, regardless of the leadership.