About speaker: Timofey Shalpegin (University of Auckland)

Timofey is lecturer at the Uni. Auckland Business School. He received his PhD in Operations and Supply Chain Management at HEC Paris. He works on collaborative product development with an emphasis on solving conflicting incentives in the supply chain.

Topic: “Supplier Allocation in Collaborative Product Development with Internal Competition”

Abstract: This research examines the development process employed by firms when exploring alternative approaches for the creation of a single product. To this end, firms employ internal teams that compete against one another while also engaging key suppliers responsible for developing a vital component through collaboration with one or more internal teams. This study aims to examine the effects of internal competition on suppliers' collaborative efforts, the firm's profits, and the optimal allocation of internal teams to potential suppliers. We develop a tournament model featuring two suppliers that differ in both expertise for the specific development project and development costs. Despite companies' diligent efforts to identify the supplier with superior expertise, our findings suggest that allocating more teams to the stronger supplier tends to undermine their incentives to exert high levels of effort. Consequently, allocating the majority of teams to that supplier may not always result in improved firm profits.

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