Manufacturer blockchain technology adoption strategies for different sales channels in an e-commerce platform supply chain

Blockchain technology (BT) adoption in a platform supply chain can provide consumers with reliable product information traceability, thus meeting consumer needs and improving product image, but bringing high BT adoption costs to the supply chain members. This work focuses on a dual-channel e-commerce platform supply chain consisting of a manufacturer and two platforms, i.e., a reselling platform and an agent platform, both with established blockchain systems. All four strategies for the manufacturer to adopt and not to adopt BT on the two platforms are examined. The results show that intuitively the manufacturer should (not) adopt BT in the two platforms when its BT adoption cost is low (high). Interestingly, the commission rate charged by the agent platform affects the manufacturer BT adoption decision when the BT adoption cost is moderate, and the manufacturer should adopt BT only in the channel with the agent (reselling) platform if the commission rate is low (high). Counterintuitively, adopting BT in the e-commerce platform supply chain does not necessarily increase product demand. Four extensions are examined to broaden the applicability of the basic models, and some interesting findings are obtained.