Title: Uncertain cost information sharing strategy in a closed-loop supply chain

Authors: Qiuling Meng; Lijuan Wan; Quanwu Zhao

Addresses: School of Economics and Management, Southwest University of Science and Technology, Mianyang, Sichuan 621010, China ' School of Economics and Business Administration, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400044, China ' School of Economics and Business Administration, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400044, China

Abstract: Remanufacturing is a meaningful way to realise the circular economy, and many manufacturers practice it. Usually, the manufacturer keeps private information about remanufacturing costs because remanufacturing is a relatively new business with an uncertain and complicated remanufacturing process. As a result, the asymmetric information will hinder the development of remanufacturing. To address this problem, we study cost information sharing issues in a supply chain with remanufacturing in this paper. We consider a manufacturer sourcing critical components from a supplier to manufacturing new products and collecting end-of-use products for remanufacturing. In our model, the volume of new products constrains the output of remanufacturing (i.e., quantity constraint). When the quantity constraint works, sharing information lowers the wholesale price. It is advantageous to the manufacturer within a moderate new product cost. Furthermore, we show that sharing information can benefit both social welfare and the environment.

Keywords: supply chain management; remanufacturing; information sharing; environmental performance; game theory.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTM.2023.128797

International Journal of Technology Management, 2023 Vol.92 No.1/2, pp.95 - 111

Received: 29 Mar 2021
Accepted: 24 Feb 2022
Published online: 06 Feb 2023 *

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