Research On Supply Chain Operation Decision Considering The Private Brand Of The E-commerce Platform Under External Reference Effect Of The Consumers

With the rapid development of Internet technology and increasingly fierce market competition,more and more manufacturers establish cooperation or trading relationships with the e-commerce platforms through selling mode or retailing mode in order to broaden their market channels.Accordingly,in order to improve their competitiveness,many e-commerce platforms have implemented the private brand strategy while selling manufacturers’ products.However,due to the close positioning and similar functions of the products,manufacturers’ products and private brand products of e-commerce platforms will inevitably compete.On the one hand,the consumers may take one of them as a reference point and make a purchase decision after comparison.At this time,the investment and pricing decisions of competitors will affect the strategies of other enterprises by the external reference effect of the consumers.On the other hand,the frequent information exchange and personnel transfer between enterprises which producing similar products may cause technology spillover.Such kind of free-riding behavior will affect the technology investment decisions and profits of both enterprises,and then affect the price competition between the two products.Therefore,based on the actual background,this paper considers the external reference effect of the consumers and studies the operation decision of the supply chain with e-commerce platform private brand under different online sales modes and technology spillovers.This paper mainly consists of three parts.In the first part,we consider the situation of non-technology spillover,and establish the supply chain decision-making model under the external reference effect of the consumers and the two sales modes of selling and retailing respectively.Then we study the technology investment decision,pricing decision and sales mode selection of manufacturers and e-commerce platforms with private brands.In the second part,on the basis of the first part,we further consider the situation of one-way technology spillover caused by manufacturers’technology investment,and establish the supply chain decision-making model under the external reference effect of the consumers and the two sales modes of selling and retailing respectively.Then we study the technology investment decision,pricing decision and sales mode selection of manufacturers and e-commerce platforms with private brands;In the third part,on the basis of the second part,we further consider the situation that there is technology investment of both manufacturers and e-commerce platforms,so there is two-way technology spillover between them.and establish the supply chain decision-making model under the external reference effect of the consumers and the two sales modes of selling and retailing respectively.Then we study the technology investment decision,pricing decision and sales mode selection of manufacturers and e-commerce platforms with private brands.The results show that:(1)The external reference effect of the consumers will aggravate the price competition between the two products,especially in the selling mode,both sides are more likely to fall into the irrational price war.And it is always unfavorable to the manufacturer’s profit and favorable to the e-commerce platform’s profit.(2)In the case of one-way technology spillover,technology spillover is always not conducive to the manufacturer’s decision-making and profit;Although it is conducive to the pricing and profit of e-commerce platform,it is not that the higher the better.In the case of two-way technology spillover,technology spillover can reduce the price of two products and benefit the supply chain members.(3)The smaller the difference of production cost between two products is,the higher manufacturers’ technology investment is,but the technology investment of e-commerce platform will reduce.The relationship between the price of two products and the difference coefficient of production cost is mainly affected by the coefficient of technology investment cost.(4)The sales mode preference of manufacturer and e-commerce platform is mainly affected by the commission rate.When the commission rate is moderate,both sides prefer the selling mode.In addition,the external reference effect of the consumers and the technology spillover will not directly affect the sales model preference,but they will affect the degree and trend of the model preference.