We investigate upstream coopetition and competition in a supply chain in the context of a high-quality brand manufacturer’s strategy on upstream outsourcing and e-commerce platform’s strategy on downstream information disclosure. The high-quality brand manufacturer outsources production and sells through an e-commerce platform, where a low-quality manufacturer also sells. The high-quality manufacturer may outsource to a third manufacturer who produces only the brand manufacturer’s high-quality product, maintaining a competition relationship with the low-quality manufacturer (competition strategy). The high-quality brand manufacturer also has the option to outsource to the low-quality manufacturer, entering into a coopetition relationship (coopetition strategy). The consumers have knowledge about the quality of the two products, but they are uncertain about their quality preference. That is, they are not sure which of the two quality-differentiated products available in the market will meet their own needs. Their uncertainty can be eliminated by the e-commerce platform’s disclosure of preference-revealing information. We find that the brand manufacturer prefers the coopetition strategy when the ratio of the two products’ cost-quality efficiencies is very low or moderate. The e-commerce platform has an incentive to disclose preference-revealing information when the ratio of the two products’ cost-quality efficiencies is moderate or high. We show the optimal strategies of the supply chain with the brand manufacturer’s outsourcing strategy and the platform’s information disclosure strategy, and we also extend the discussion to the impacts of several related issues.

我们在优质品牌制造商的上游外包策略和电子商务平台的下游信息披露策略的背景下调查了供应链中的上游竞合和竞争。优质品牌厂家外包生产，通过电商平台销售，劣质厂家也进行销售。优质厂商可以外包给只生产品牌厂商优质产品的第三方厂商，与劣质厂商保持竞争关系（竞争策略）。优质品牌厂商也可以选择外包给劣质厂商，形成竞合关系（coopetition strategy）。消费者了解这两种产品的质量，但他们不确定自己的质量偏好。也就是说，他们不确定市场上提供的两种质量差异化产品中的哪一种能够满足自己的需求。他们的不确定性可以通过电子商务平台公开偏好信息来消除。我们发现，当两种产品的成本质量效率之比很低或适中时，品牌制造商更喜欢合作竞争策略。当两种产品的成本质量效率比值适中或较高时，电商平台有披露偏好信息的动机。我们通过品牌厂商的外包策略和平台的信息披露策略来展示供应链的最优策略，并将讨论扩展到几个相关问题的影响。