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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of price adjustment speed on the stability of Bertrand–Nash equilibrium in the context of a dual-channel supply chain competition.

The paper considers a dual-channel supply chain comprising a manufacturer, a traditional retailer and an online retailer. A two-dimensional discrete dynamical system is used to examine the Bertrand competition between the retailers. The retailers are assumed to follow bounded rational expectations. Local stability of Bertrand–Nash equilibrium is investigated with respect to the price adjustment speed.

As the price adjustment speed increases, the stability of Bertrand–Nash equilibrium is lost, leading to complex chaotic dynamics. The results showed that chaotic dynamics deteriorates the profit of the retailers. The authors also found that the chaos can be controlled using an adaptive adjustment mechanism and the retailers enjoy higher profit when the chaos is controlled.

This study helps retail managers to choose an appropriate price adjustment speed to maximize profit.

The heterogeneity of the retailers is not considered in the studies involving dynamics of retailer competition. This paper contributes to the literature by considering the operational difference between a traditional retailer and an online retailer, i.e. price adjustment speed. In addition, the study establishes a link between price adjustment speed and profit.

States that the Stackelberg leadership model is rarely used to describe market price determination perhaps because of the lack of a theoretical basis for selecting the minimum size necessary for leadership. Provides structural sufficiency conditions for selecting a unique Stackelberg leader based on the concept of Pareto dominance, in which the structural criterion involves the relative capacity shares of the first and second largest market rivals. Suggests that the Stackelberg price game is a viable static equilibrium construct even though the fringe firms are not atomistic. Applies the Stackelberg model to antitrust merger analysis.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework to help business marketers with online and traditional retail channels (multi‐channel retailers) to find the optimal branding strategy and market structure in order to maximize their profits.

A game‐theoretic model is developed to determine the optimal branding strategy and market structure for the dual‐channel stores of a multi‐channel retailer.

The paper demonstrates that an optimal branding strategy and market structure exists for the dual‐channel stores of a multi‐channel retailer. When a retailer uses multiple channels in parallel to sell its product, the optimal branding strategy is to employ as large as possible brand differentiation between the dual‐channel stores, particularly when the price is less sensitive for consumers and the market base size is larger. Furthermore, it is also found that the optimal market structure is the Stackelberg mode, especially when the product brands between the two channels are less differentiated.

The present study assumed that all information is known to both the online and traditional channels of a multi‐channel retailer. However, information could be incomplete. It is recommended that future research explore the value of product brand differentiation under incomplete information settings.

The paper provides a very useful model framework, branding strategy, and market structure for business managers who are using or planning to use multiple channels to sell their products.

This paper fills a conceptual and practical gap for a structured analysis of the current state of knowledge about multi‐channel branding strategies. The paper provides practical and solid advice and examples demonstrating the application of product brand differentiation strategies for business managers.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework to help competitive firms find optimal pricing and brand management strategies in order to maximize their respective profits.

A game‐theoretic model is developed to determine optimal pricing and brand management strategies for competitive firms.

The study demonstrates that optimal pricing and brand management strategies exist for firms in a competitive market. The optimum marketing strategy for competitive firms to employ is the cooperative alliance pricing and brand management strategy, particularly when market competition is very intense.

The present study assumes that all information is known to all parties. However, information could be incomplete. It is recommended that future research explore pricing and brand management strategies under incomplete and asymmetric information settings.

The paper provides a very useful model framework and pricing and brand management strategy for business managers when they are doing business in a competitive market.

The paper fills a conceptual and practical gap for a structured analysis of the current state of knowledge about alliance brand. It provides practical and solid advice and examples demonstrating the application of cooperative alliance pricing and brand management strategies for business managers.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the optimal policy settings of the home government for any combination of strategic variables adopted by home and foreign firms under Brander and Spencer’s third-market model framework.

This paper follows all the assumptions of Brander and Spencer with only two modifications: firms produce differentiated products, and firms choose different strategic variables. A two-stage game is set and the subgame-perfect Nash equilibrium is deduced following backward induction.

The authors arrive at a general, simple rule to determine the optimal policy of the home government for any combination of strategic variables: regardless of the strategic variable of the domestic firm, the optimal policy of the home country is an export subsidy (tax) as long as the foreign firm’s strategic variable is output (price). The optimal subsidy or tax of the home country is shown to move the equilibrium to the Stackelberg equilibrium where the domestic firm behaves as the leader while the foreign firm behaves as a follower under free trade. With appropriate interpretations and a suitable caveat, the above results still hold in the case with multiple foreign firms which may choose different strategic variables.

This paper fills the gap in the literature, and provides some more general results not easily detected in the original model of Brander and Spencer or Eaton and Grossman.

This paper formalises the choice a firm has to face when entering a foreign market via FDI as between setting up an entirely new plant (greenfield investment) or acquiring an existing indigenous firm. We assume the existence of an asymmetric duopoly in the host country, and these duopolists face the entry of a technologically advanced foreign firm in the market. The analysis shows how different constellations of entry costs and the post‐entry competition affect the foreign firm’s entry mode choice. Simulation results show that the foreign entrant will in most cases be best off by acquiring an existing indigenous high‐technology firm, thus, forming a duopoly with an indigenous low‐technology firm. We also discuss briefly the strategic dimension to the model, where the foreign firm has the possibility of crowding out the indigenous incumbents through lowering the price.

This chapter proposes a survey of the main results produced by the literature on licensing and some original insights, with a particular focus on globalization, North–South models of technology transfer, the issue of how the intellectual property rights influences international licensing, and asymmetric information.

The purpose of this paper is to extend a theoretical framework for analyzing competition and innovation in the presence of horizontal spillovers.

A theoretical analysis approach is adopted to drive the paper’s findings.

It is shown that when firms behave non-cooperatively in both the R&D and production stages, the degree of spillover has a negative relationship with the effective and respective R&D expenditures of each firm as well as the level of social welfare. An inverted-U relationship between competition and social welfare also holds. When firms behave cooperatively in the R&D stage, and non-cooperatively in the production stage the relationship between the R&D expenditure of the joint research lab and the number of firms in the market is negative.

In the literature on R&D spillovers and process innovation, efforts are mostly focused on the comparative R&D expenditures and the relative social welfare between non-cooperative and cooperative R&D. The question of the effectiveness of R&D technology on the optimal number of firm, however, is not explicitly addressed. The paper is intended to address this lacuna.

Eco-innovation products, which means achieving more efficient and responsible use of resources and reducing the detrimental impact on the environment, can win a competitive advantage for the enterprises. But it is not easy to implement due to the high cost of eco-innovative technologies development, the uncertainty of market needs and return risk of investment. Many enterprises seek collaborations from their upstream suppliers to jointly carry out eco-innovation, such as Apple, IBM and Nike. A unique feature of collaboration is that efforts by one party enhance the marginal value of the other party's efforts. However, the collaboration will make the partner know the eco-innovation technology and prompt the partner to encroach the market to sell competitive products by herself. Motivated by this observation, this paper considers the optimal collaboration strategy on eco-innovation between upstream and downstream supply chain member and the optimal encroachment strategy of upstream supplier in a supply chain.

This paper models a supply chain wherein a supplier provides products or materials for her manufacturer and cooperates with her manufacturer in eco-innovation. Also, the supplier could encroach on the market to sell similar products by herself. Then this paper uses game theory and mathematical modeling to do relative analysis.

The analysis reveals several interesting insights. First, eco-innovation collaboration makes supplier encroachment no longer only rely on the encroachment cost. The delayed realized eco-innovation efficiency information also plays a vital role. Second, different from previous research, the authors find the manufacturer's preference for supplier encroachment depends on the uncertainty of eco-innovation efficiency and potential market demand. Third, both partial and full encroachment strategies of the supplier can effectively improve the eco-innovation level.

The paper is the first to take the interplay between collaboration and encroachment into account in a supply chain. The results caution enterprises and policymakers to take vertical collaboration and delayed realized information into account in the competitive supply chain before making any operational decisions. Furthermore, the authors propose that governmental intervention aimed at stimulating supplier encroachment in appropriate circumstances can contribute to the improved environmental performance of products.

Reverse supply chain (RSC) is one of the ways to handle product returns efficiently. Recovery of residual value from product returns also helps in achieving sustainability. Its successful implementation requires coordination among all the channel members involved in the activities, from the acquisition to collection to the disposition of returned products. This article aims to review the literature about coordination issues in the RSC.

A systematic literature review of 151 articles published during 2004–2021 is carried out. Theory, context and methodology (TCM) framework of the literature review is used to identify the research gaps for future research directions.

This study identifies the characteristics of RSC coordination. It includes channel structures; coordination mechanisms; performance measuring parameters; the methodology applied and explored industries. The review shows that game-theoretical modeling in RSC coordination is the most commonly used method to coordinate the channels. It was found that issues like disruption, fairness and corporate social responsibility are not explored in-depth and offer much potential for future research.

There are very limited studies on coordination issues in the RSC. The proposed articles add value by considering RSC issues from different strategic, government, consumers' behavior and functionality decision-making point of view.