239 / 2024-04-23 18:21:55

Information sharing, online platform, service quality competition, reseller, marketplace

Information sharing,online platform,service quality competition,reseller,marketplace

Manufacturers often enhance consumer demand by offering services such as after-sales support and warranty repairs. This research investigates demand information sharing on online retail platforms, focusing on two manufacturers that sell substitutable products through the same platform while competing on product price and service quality. Our findings reveal that both partial (PIS) and full information sharing (FIS) strategies benefit the informed manufacturer, but have no impact on the uninformed manufacturer. Compared to PIS, the informed manufacturer under FIS tends to enhance product advantages based on demand signals in the less competitive dimension. Moreover, when price (service) competition is relatively more intense, FIS increases (decreases) the value of demand information for informed manufacturers. We define the conditions under which platforms opt for PIS, FIS, or no information sharing (NIS) when acting specifically as retailers or market operators. Our analysis reveals that service competition drives platforms towards PIS, whereas price competition encourages FIS. Enhanced service efficiency under the reseller model encourages information sharing, although excessive efficiency may lead platforms to switch from FIS to PIS to mitigate the adverse competition effect. Conversely, in the marketplace model, a higher commission rate alleviates such negative effect, promoting FIS. Our examination also includes hybrid models where platforms perform dual roles, affirming the robustness of our findings across different operational nuances and modified assumptions.