This study aims to explore the impacts of manufacturers’ downstream distribution channels on upstream sourcing strategy and of the business relationship between manufacturers resulting from upstream sourcing transactions on downstream distribution strategy, through investigating the interplay of co-opetition and decentralization. We consider a framework with two manufacturers producing substitutable products. In the upstream component market, one manufacturer needs to source a key component from either a third-party supplier or its competing manufacturer. In the downstream consumer market, each manufacturer sells the end product through either an integrated or a decentralized distribution channel. The two channels engage in a price competition. For a given downstream distribution strategy, we find that even at a higher component price, the manufacturer who purchases the component may have incentive to source from its competitor that has an integrated channel, while having no incentive to choose a decentralized competitor. A key driver behind this contrast is that co-opetition can be substituted by a decentralized channel used by the competitor, which enables the manufacturer who purchases the component to mitigate price competition more efficiently. For a given upstream sourcing strategy, in contrast to the literature which shows that manufacturers generally prefer downstream decentralization at high competition intensity, we find that integration is always preferred by manufacturers who engage in supplier–buyer cooperation. A key underlying driver is that co-opetition helps the manufacturer who sells the component mitigate price competition more efficiently than decentralization. We also extend our analysis by investigating manufacturers’ decisions on both sourcing and distribution strategies.

本研究旨在通过研究合作竞争与分散化的相互作用，探讨制造商下游分销渠道对上游采购策略的影响以及上游采购交易产生的制造商之间的业务关系对下游分销策略的影响。我们考虑采用两个制造商生产可替代产品的框架。在上游零部件市场，制造商需要从第三方供应商或其竞争制造商处采购关键零部件。在下游消费市场，每个制造商通过集成或分散的分销渠道销售最终产品。两个渠道展开价格竞争。对于给定的下游分销策略，我们发现即使组件价格较高，购买组件的制造商可能有动力从拥有集成渠道的竞争对手那里采购，而没有动力选择分散的竞争对手。这种对比背后的一个关键驱动因素是，竞合可以被竞争对手使用的分散渠道所取代，这使得购买组件的制造商能够更有效地缓解价格竞争。对于给定的上游采购策略，与文献显示制造商在高竞争强度下通常更喜欢下游分散化相反，我们发现从事供需合作的制造商总是倾向于整合。一个关键的潜在驱动因素是，合作竞争可以帮助销售组件的制造商比分散化更有效地缓解价格竞争。我们还通过调查制造商在采购和分销策略方面的决策来扩展我们的分析。