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Impact of the Internet on Intermediaries

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Impact of the Internet on Intermediaries Impact of the Internet on Intermediaries By Anurag Mehra M.B.A (1990), University of Delhi B.Tech. (1988), Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL & ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING (CENTER FOR TRANSPORTATION STUDIES) IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ENGINEERING IN LOGISTICS at the MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY June 1999 @ 1999 Anurag Mehra, All Rights Reserved The author hereby grants to MIT permission to reproduce and distribute publicly paper and electronic copies of this thesis document in whole or in part Signature of the Author ....................... Uv................................................. Depa ment of Civil & Environmental Engineering Center for Transportation Studies May 7, 1999 C ertified b y ....................................... ....... ................................. Yossi Sheffi Director, MIT enter for Transportation Studies Thesis Supervisor Accepted by ..................................... W hittle Chair, Departmental Committee on Graduate Studies MASSACHUS Impact of the Internet on Intermediaries by Anurag Mehra Submitted to the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Engineering in Logistics Abstract The exponential growth of the Internet has led to the growing debate about "disintermediation, i.e. the elimination of intermediaries from markets. Many believe that traditional intermediaries will soon become extinct because the Internet allows producers to sell directly to consumers in a more cost-effective way. The debate on disintermediation in the literature has so far focussed only on "elimination" of intermediaries, which assumes that all the functions performed by intermediaries can be disintermediated by the Internet. A deeper analysis of the raison d'etre of intermediaries suggests that "elimination" of intermediaries is an extremely unlikely scenario. Broadly speaking, intermediaries perform three functions in a marketing channel: information & transaction function, logistics function and trust function. Clearly, the Internet can impact only the information and transaction function, while the logistics and trust issues still need to be addressed. This thesis explores the issue of disintermediation from a different perspective: how the Internet will lead to reorganization of intermediary functions and what kind of disintermediation scenarios may emerge. It assumes that the allocation of different functions among various entities in a channel (manufacturers, intermediaries and consumers) will depend on who can perform the function more efficiently in the long run. Based on this premise, the thesis explores various disintermediation scenarios and their applicability to different industries in relation to the consumer needs and buying behavior. The thesis develops a framework in terms of a decision flowchart that can be used to evaluate the possibility of different disintermediation scenarios for specific products/ industries. The framework fulfills the twin objectives of integrating the different approaches on distribution channels found in the literature and providing a starting point for further research on industry-wise impact of the Internet on channel structure. Thesis supervisor: Yossi Sheffi Title: Director, MIT Center for Transportation Studies 3 To my parents, my wife Ekta and our newly born son Anirudh 4 Acknowledgements I would like to thank Prof. Yossi Sheffi for his guidance, encouragement and thoughtful criticism during the entire duration of my thesis work. Our 'weekly meetings', without which it may have been impossible to finish this thesis in this short duration of time, tremendously helped me in focussing on the key issues of this thesis. I am also grateful to Mr. Jonathan Byrnes for his constructive feedback on the first draft of this thesis. 5 Table of Contents 1 IN TR O D U C TION :............................................................................................................................... 6 2 CON TEX T A N D LITERA TU RE R EV IEW :................................................................................... 11 2.1 COST OF INTERM EDIATION:.......................................................................................... ....... 11 2.2 D IRECT CHANNELS: ....................................................................................................................... 12 2.3 INDIRECT CHANNELS: ............................................................................-....................................... 15 2.3.1 Role of intermediaries: ....................................................................................................... 15 2.3.2 Channel Structure:................................................................................... ................ ...... 17 2.4 IM PACT OF THE INTERNET: ......................................................................................................... 27 3 RESEA R CH H Y PO TH ESIS:............................................................................................................ 32 4 RESTRUCTURING OF INTERMEDIARY FUNCTIONS: .......................................................... 36 4.1 INFORM ATION INTERM EDIARIES ................................................................................... 36 4.2 LOGISTICS INTERMEDIARIES ......................................................................................... ......... 39 4.3 V ALUE-ADDED INTERMEDIARIES ................................................................................. .......... 40 5 DEVELOPING AN INTEGRATED FRAMEWORK: ................................................................... 42 5.1 KEY FACTORS AFFECTING DISTRIBUTION CHANNEL STRUCTURE ................................................... 43 5.2 IM PACT OF THE INTERNET & 3PL SERVICES: ................................................................................. 48 5.3 CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR ................................................................................................... 50 5.4 D ECISION FLOW CHART ...........................................................................- -....... ---.--........ --....... 54 6 EX PLO RA TO R Y A N A LY SIS:..................................................................................................... 59 6.1 (D IS)INTERM EDIATION SCENARIOS: ............................................................................................ 59 6.2 CASE STUDIES:..........................................................................................--.-............................. 75 6.2.1 Books: ................................................................................................................................... 75 6.2.2 Computers:............................................................................................................................ 79 6.3 LIM ITATIONS OF EXPLORATORY ANALYSIS:................................................................................... 84 7 CON C LU SIO N :.................................................................................................................................. 85 7.1 THESIS FINDINGS: .............................................................- .-....... -... ---................................... 85 7.2 FUTURE RESEARCH: ..................................................................................... --.-.. --...................... 86 8 REFER EN C ES:.................................................................................................-----......- --. --............88 6 1 Introduction: Rapid technological progress in information and communication technologies along with their widespread diffusion have led to speculation about "frictionless" economies in which transaction costs are nearly zero, barriers to entry disappear, and markets clear instantly. Some think that electronic commerce, with producers selling directly to consumers over computer networks such as the Internet, will eliminate existing intermediaries ("disintermediation") and drastically reduce transaction costs (OECD, 1998). Transaction costs: The work done by Ronald H. Coase in introducing the concept of transaction costs in understanding why firms exist in the form and size that they are, is perhaps more relevant now than ever. In his article "The Nature of the Firm" (published in 1937, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1991), he addressed the following basic question (Coase, 1992): "Why do firms exist, if the pricing mechanism (Adam Smith's 'invisible hand') can do all the coordination necessary for markets to work?" Coase found that the answer lies in transaction costs. He realized that there were costs involved in using the price mechanism: costs related to negotiations, contracts, inspections, dispute settlements etc. It was the avoidance of the costs of carrying out transactions through the market that could explain the existence of firms in which allocation of factors came about by administrative decisions rather than price mechanism. Hence, Coase argued that a firm would grow in size up to a point when the cost of internal coordination exceeds the cost of market transactions. Similarly, a firm would outsource an activity or a function if the transaction cost were lower than internal coordination cost. 7 The role of intermediaries in a market can be explained in terms of reduction in transaction costs. For a firm trying to sell directly
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