Bargaining within the Supply Chain and Its Implications in an Industry
研究了供应链内部讨价还价能力对行业的影响，发现制造商主导和垂直整合是讨价还价合同的特例，竞争激烈时制造商主导可协调供应链，但行业协调可能违反反垄断法。
ABSTRACT Our main objective is to investigate the influence of the bargaining power within a chain on its industry. As a building block, we first discuss the implications of bargaining within a single chain by considering an asymmetric Nash bargaining over the wholesale price (BW). We show that both Manufacturer Stackelberg (MS) and vertical integration (VI) strategies are special cases of the BW contract. We then develop the Nash equilibrium in an industry with two supply chains that use BW. We identify the profit‐maximizing (coordinating) bargaining power within this industry. We show that when a chain is not monopolistic, VI does not coordinate the chain and that the MS contract, where the manufacturer has all the bargaining power, is coordinating when competition is intense. We find that the main determinant of the equilibrium in mature industries is to respond well to the actions of the competing chain rather than to directly maximize the profit of each chain. That is, the equilibrium does not necessarily maximize the profit of the entire industry. While a coordination of the industry could then increase the profitability of both chains, such a coordination is likely against antitrust law. Moreover, if one chain cannot change its actions, the other chain may unilaterally improve its profitability by deviating from the equilibrium. Our results lead to several predictions supported by empirical findings, such as that in competitive industries chains will work “close to” the MS contract.