Coordination Mechanism In Platform Digital Empowerment Supply Chain Under Demand Uncertainty

In recent years,with the rapid development of the cloud computing and big data industries and the continuous deepening in the application of the industry,the concept of "data empowerment" has gradually come into the public's attention.The enabler improves the data acquisition,analysis and application capabilities for the empowered through the use of data or the promotion and innovation of data technology and methods,and ultimately achieves cocreation of value.Among them,the e-commerce platforms which has the advantage of operating data have gradually transformed from a single "selling channel" to "digitalization solution platform",and have promoted platform digital empowerment through various measures.Those platform digital empowerment behaviors help online and offline retailers to continuously improve data processing capabilities,expand market demand and improve operational performance,then ultimately achieve co-creation of supply chain value.However,the choices made by supply chain members for maximizing their own interests often harm the interests of the other party.It is necessary to formulate appropriate coordination contracts to improve the performance of supply chain members.Therefore,this article examines the impact of platform digital empowerment behavior on consumer market demand in an environment of uncertain demand,and discusses the problems in the supply chain system that platforms use data to empower offline and online retailers,including:(1)The decision-making mechanism and optimal profit of the supply chain members;(2)Whether the cost-sharing contract and the revenue-sharing contract can coordinate the supply chain and realize the Pareto improvement of the supply chain members.First,according to the digital empowerment mode of the platform to offline retailers,this paper builds a three-tier supply chain system consisting of one supplier,one platform and n homogeneous retailers without competition,and discusses the decision-making mechanism and coordination strategy.The results of formula derivation and numerical simulation show that:(1)retailers will always choose to accept platform digital empowerment;(2)both revenue-sharing contract and cost-sharing contract can coordinate the supply chain to a certain extent,but costsharing contracts are better(3)due to the existence of the platform network effect,the greater the number of platform participants,the higher the profits of the supply chain members.(4)The sensitivity of market demand and the cost coefficient of digital empowerment have an impact on profit and contract selection,and cost-sharing contracts are more applicable.Secondly,according to the digital empowerment model of the platform to online retailers,this paper builds a two-tier supply chain system consisting of one platform and one retailer,and discusses the decision-making mechanism and coordination strategy of the platform and the retailer.The results of formula derivation and numerical simulation show that:(1)when platform digital empowerment has little effect on the retailer's expense increase,the retailer will choose to accept it;(2)two types of cost sharing contracts for retailer to share platform digital empowerment costs and platform to share retailer data application inputs can both coordinate the supply chain to a certain extent,but the former is more effective;(3)cost coefficients and market sensitivity will affect supply chain profits and contract selection.Considering the reality,the contract for retailers to share the cost of platform digital empowerment is more applicable.The main innovations of this article are:(1)discussing the influence of platform data empowerment on important decision variables and profits of supply chain under the environment of uncertain demand;(2)using quantitative methods to examine the role of platform network effects;(3)trying to open the platform-enabled black box from a data perspective.