Firms’ green R&D cooperation behaviour in a supply chain: Technological spillover, power and coordination

Xu Chen, Xiaojun Wang and Mingmei Zhou

International Journal of Production Economics, 2019, vol. 218, issue C, 118-134

Abstract: In response to the global fight against climate change, a growing number of firms cooperate with their supply chain partners on green innovations. This study explores firms' green R&D cooperation behaviour in a two-echelon supply chain in which a manufacturer and a retailer first cooperate to invest green R&D and then organise production according to a wholesale price contract. Through a comparison with non-cooperation models, we evaluate the effects of green R&D cooperation on the economic, environmental and social performances of the supply chain while simultaneously considering the technological spillover and supply chain power relationship. Our findings show that the R&D cooperation's improvement of firms' economic performance is mainly determined by firms' own green contribution level. This level is dependent on firms' green R&D investment efficiency and spillover as well as on their relevant power relationship with their supply chain partners. Interestingly, there is a Pareto improvement region in which the green R&D cooperation has a positive impact on firms, customers and the environment. In the case of a non-Pareto improvement region, supply chain coordination can be achieved through a two-part tariff contract. This applies to all three of the supply chain power structures investigated in this research.

Keywords: Green R&D; Cooperation; Technological spillover; Low-carbon supply chain (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (31)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0925527319301628
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:proeco:v:218:y:2019:i:c:p:118-134

DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpe.2019.04.033

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Production Economics is currently edited by Stefan Minner

More articles in International Journal of Production Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().