Huang Shuai, Du Bingzhi, Fan Zhi-Ping, Liu Zhixi
Department of Management Science and Engineering, Business School, Qingdao University, Qingdao, China.
Department of Information Management and Decision Sciences, School of Business Administration, Northeastern University, Shenyang, China.
Front Psychol. 2023 Jan 10;13:1078369. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1078369. eCollection 2022.
The rise of live-stream selling has made the e-commerce platform attractive to many small and medium-sized retailers that are often faced with capital constraints. The choice between the e-commerce platform financing (EPF) and trade credit financing (TCF) for the capital-constrained e-retailers engaging in live-stream selling is particularly important problem.
This paper considers a supply chain made up of a manufacturer, an e-commerce platform that offers live-stream selling service to consumers and an online retailer with capital constraint. We, respectively, investigate the optimal decisions of the supply chain enterprises under EPF and TCF modes based on Stackelberg game models and optimization theories.
We compare the profits of supply chain firms under different cases and obtain some important conclusions through theoretical and numerical analysis.
First, when the e-commerce platform's commission rate is low enough, the retailer's ordering quantity is, under EPF mode, greater than that evidenced without capital constraint. In addition, when the retailer's marginal profit is high and the e-commerce platform's commission rate is low, the online retailer should choose EPF mode; in other instances, TCF is its optimal choice. Second, the e-commerce platform can obtain the highest profit under EPF mode, while TCF mode will bring the highest profit to the manufacturer. Third, when the platform's commission rate is below a certain threshold, the profit of the entire supply chain under EPF mode is larger than that of well-funded supply chain, but TCF mode cannot. Finally, we also find there exists the access threshold about the live-stream selling. Only when the commission rate is relatively high, the e-commerce platform should offers live-stream service to consumers and the live-stream investment is the highest under EPF mode.
直播销售的兴起使电子商务平台对许多经常面临资金限制的中小型零售商具有吸引力。对于从事直播销售的资金受限的电子零售商而言，在电子商务平台融资（EPF）和贸易信贷融资（TCF）之间做出选择是一个尤为重要的问题。
本文考虑一个由制造商、向消费者提供直播销售服务的电子商务平台以及资金受限的在线零售商组成的供应链。我们分别基于斯塔克尔伯格博弈模型和优化理论，研究了EPF和TCF模式下供应链企业的最优决策。
我们比较了不同情况下供应链企业的利润，并通过理论和数值分析得出了一些重要结论。
首先，当电子商务平台的佣金率足够低时，在EPF模式下零售商的订购量大于无资金限制时的订购量。此外，当零售商的边际利润较高且电子商务平台的佣金率较低时，在线零售商应选择EPF模式；在其他情况下，TCF是其最优选择。其次，电子商务平台在EPF模式下可获得最高利润，而TCF模式将为制造商带来最高利润。第三，当平台的佣金率低于某个阈值时，EPF模式下整个供应链的利润大于资金充足的供应链，但TCF模式则不然。最后，我们还发现存在直播销售的准入门槛。只有当佣金率相对较高时，电子商务平台才应向消费者提供直播服务，且EPF模式下的直播投资最高。
