Entry and Product Variety with Competing Supply Chains

We study a supply chain model where competing manufacturers located around a circle contract with privately informed and exclusive retailers. The number of brands in the market (determined by the manufacturers’ zero profit condition) depends on the level of asymmetric information within supply chains and on the types of contracts between manufacturers and retailers. With two-part tariffs, wholesale prices fully reflect retailers’ costs. With linear contracts, wholesale prices are constant and independent of retailers’ costs. The number of brands is lower (resp. higher) with asymmetric information than with complete information when contracts are linear (resp. with two-part tariffs). Moreover, the number of brands is always higher with linear contracts than with two-part tari¤s. We also analyze the effects of endogenous entry on welfare.