Many manufacturers have recently taken the initiative to enhance their demand forecasts with the help of modern data analytics tools. Motivated by this trend, this paper examines the implications of encroachment when an upstream manufacturer privately observes the demand information. We analyze a signaling game between a manufacturer and a retailer. The manufacturer privately observes the actual forecast signal of the customer’s marginal utility of a product, and then determines a wholesale price, which may signal its private information. Upon receiving the wholesale price, the retailer decides how much to sell in the retail channel. The manufacturer, if in possession of a direct channel, finally determines how much to sell in this channel. Our analysis reveals that encroachment by a better-informed manufacturer has many different implications that have not been documented in the literature. In particular, we find that compared with the prior literature focusing on a better-informed retailer, when the upstream manufacturer is better informed, encroachment will more likely result in a lose-lose outcome. Additionally, if better informed, the retailer may not opt to credibly share information. By contrast, we show that in the presence of a better-informed manufacturer, both supply chain parties are willing to establish the capability of credible information sharing unless it is too costly to do so. Interestingly, we demonstrate that a greater degree of information asymmetry or a larger direct selling cost has the potential to benefit both supply chain parties; however, more accurate information may hurt them and inhibit the manufacturer from encroachment.

许多制造商最近主动借助现代数据分析工具来增强他们的需求预测。在这种趋势的推动下，本文探讨了当上游制造商私下观察需求信息时，侵占的含义。我们分析了制造商和零售商之间的信号博弈。制造商私下观察客户对产品边际效用的实际预测信号，然后确定批发价格，这可能是其隐私信息的信号。零售商收到批发价后，决定在零售渠道销售多少。制造商如果拥有直销渠道，最终决定在该渠道销售多少。我们的分析表明，消息灵通的制造商的侵占具有许多不同的含义，这些含义尚未在文献中记录。特别是，我们发现，与之前关注消息灵通的零售商的文献相比，当上游制造商消息灵通时，侵占更有可能导致双输的结果。此外，如果消息灵通，零售商可能不会选择可靠地共享信息。相比之下，我们表明，在消息灵通的制造商存在的情况下，供应链双方都愿意建立可靠的信息共享能力，除非这样做的成本太高。有趣的是，我们证明了更大程度的信息不对称或更大的直销成本有可能使供应链双方都受益；然而，