Impacts of platform coupons and power structure on an e-commerce supply chain

Abstract

This paper considers an e-commerce supply chain consisting of a manufacturer and an online platform and investigates the manufacturer's pricing decisions without and with platform coupons and the online platform's coupon decision under different power structures. In the manufacturer (platform) Stackelberg power structure, issuing platform coupons cannot (can) always stimulate the demand and benefit the manufacturer, the online platform, and the entire system. In the vertical Nash power structure, issuing platform coupons can always stimulate demand and benefit the manufacturer and the entire system but cannot always benefit the online platform.