Abstract The fourth-party platform provides an alternative consumption channel that greatly saves transaction costs. As a new e-commerce phenomenon that appears more in the service industry, it integrates the original third-party platforms and is about to gain considerable development. This paper investigates whether it is favorable for a third-party platform to join the fourth-party platform. The best choice of third-party platform is discussed from three dimensions of profit, consumer surplus and social welfare. The Hotelling model and Pyramid Spatial model are established to describe the competition between different platforms and the choice of agents, and the Stackelberg game is constructed with commission rates as the decision variables. The main conclusions of this study include: i) the impact of commission rates is largely dependent on the business model of the third-party platform, such as the price of the service sold and whether it is consumer-oriented; ii) when the optimal commission rates are adopted by platforms, joining the fourth-party platform can bring greater profits to the consumer-oriented third-party platform and create greater consumer surplus and social welfare. This paper fills the gap of existing literature by providing decision support for the third-party platform under the vigorous development of the fourth-party platform.

中文翻译：

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整合第三方平台：真的会伤害他们吗？

摘要 第四方平台提供了另一种消费渠道，大大节省了交易成本。作为一种在服务业中出现较多的电子商务新现象，它整合了原有的第三方平台，即将获得长足的发展。本文探讨第三方平台加入第四方平台是否有利。从利润、消费者剩余和社会福利三个维度讨论第三方平台的最佳选择。建立Hotelling模型和Pyramid Spatial模型来描述不同平台之间的竞争和代理的选择，并以佣金率作为决策变量构建Stackelberg博弈。本研究的主要结论包括：i) 佣金率的影响很大程度上取决于第三方平台的商业模式，例如所售服务的价格以及是否面向消费者；ii) 当平台采用最优佣金率时，加入第四方平台可以为面向消费者的第三方平台带来更大的利润，创造更大的消费者剩余和社会福利。本文在第四方平台蓬勃发展的情况下，为第三方平台提供决策支持，填补了现有文献的空白。加入第四方平台可以为面向消费者的第三方平台带来更大的利润，创造更大的消费者剩余和社会福利。本文在第四方平台蓬勃发展的情况下，为第三方平台提供决策支持，填补了现有文献的空白。加入第四方平台可以为面向消费者的第三方平台带来更大的利润，创造更大的消费者剩余和社会福利。本文在第四方平台蓬勃发展的情况下，为第三方平台提供决策支持，填补了现有文献的空白。