AccScience Publishing / SCMR / Online First / DOI: 10.36922/SCMR025380007
ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE

Supply chain coordination under buyback contract in a three-stage supply chain: A game theory approach

Gülçin Canbulut1* Erkan Köse1
Show Less
1 Department of Industrial Engineering, Nuh Naci Yazgan University, Erkilet, Kayseri, Turkey
Received: 15 September 2025 | Revised: 22 October 2025 | Accepted: 5 November 2025 | Published online: 18 November 2025
© 2025 by the Author(s). This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution -Noncommercial 4.0 International License (CC-by the license) ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ )
Abstract

Supply chain is the general name of the structure formed by all actors who contribute to the delivery of a product or service to the customer. A typical supply chain may involve stages such as customers, retailers, wholesalers/distributors, manufacturers, and component/raw material suppliers. Each stage is connected through the flow of products, information, and funds. The objective of the supply chain is to maximize the overall value generated. The value is the difference between the amount the customer is willing to pay for the product and service the supply chain offers to the customer, and the total cost of the supply chain. The contracts are one of the tools used recently to reduce costs and ensure coordination between all actors. Game theory is essential for the analysis of supply chains with multiple agents, often with conflicting objectives. In this study, the buyback contract, which is one of the most used contract types to ensure supply chain coordination, is handled with the game theory approach. Based on the similarity of the relations between the supply chain actors to the relationship between the players in n-person cooperative games, buyback contracts are examined within the scope of n-person cooperative games. The results have shown that fairer profit sharing can be achieved if the game theory approach is used in buyback contracts. It is anticipated that this proposed solution approach will contribute to literature, providing a guide for future studies in this field.

Keywords
Supply chain
Buyback contract
Game theory
N-person cooperative game
Shapley value
Funding
None.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
References
  1. Yao Z, Leung CH, Lai KK. Manufacturer’s revenue-sharing contract and retail competition. Eur J Oper Res. 2007;186(2):637-651. doi: 10.1016/j.ejor.2006.03.068

 

  1. Tsay AA, Nahmias S. Supply chain contracts: A review. In: Tayur S, Ganeshan R, Magazine M, editors. Quantitative Models for Supply Chain Management. Boston, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers; 1999. p. 299-336.

 

  1. Cachon GP. Supply chain coordination with contracts. In: De Kok AG, Graves SC, editors. Supply Chain Management: Design, Coordination and Operation. Handbooks in Operations Research and Management Science. Amsterdam: Elsevier; 2003. p. 229-340.

 

  1. Wang CX. A general framework of supply chain contract models. Suppl Chain Manag. 2002;7(5):302-310. doi: 10.1108/13598540210447724

 

  1. Pasternack BA. Optimal pricing and return policies for perishable commodities. Mark Sci. 1985;4(2):166-176. doi: 10.1287/mksc.4.2.166

 

  1. Tsay AA. The quantity flexibility contract and supplier-customer incentives. Manag Sci. 1999;45(10):1339-1358. doi: 10.1287/mnsc.45.10.1339

 

  1. Eppen GD, Iyer AV. Backup agreements in fashion buying: The value of upstream flexibility. Manag Sci. 1997;43(11):1469-1484. doi: 10.1287/mnsc.43.11.1469

 

  1. Canbulut G, Köse E, Arık OA. Handling of revenue sharing contracts within the scope of game theory. Soft Comput. 2020;24:10547-10561. doi: 10.1007/s00500-020-05142-w

 

  1. Farzadmehr M, Taleizadeh AA, Thaichon P. Price optimization in supply chain agreements: A comparative analysis of buyback and put option contracts for inventory risk management. J Revenue Pricing Manag. 2025;24(1):74-91. doi: 10.1057/s41272-024-00500-x

 

  1. Momeni MA, Razminia A, Hashemi SH, Esmaeili A. A novel buy-back contract coordination mechanism for a manufacturer-retailer circular supply chain. J Clean Prod. 2022;377:134260. doi: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2022.134260

 

  1. Cachon GP, Netessine S. Game theory in supply chain analysis. In: Simchi-Levi D, Wu SD, Shen ZF, editors. Handbook of Quantitative Supply Chain Analysis: Modeling in the eBusiness Era. Boston, MA: Springer; 2004. p. 13-66. doi: 10.1007/978-1-4020-7953-8_2

 

  1. Devangan L, Amit RK, Mehta P, Swami S, Shanker K. Individually rational buyback contracts with inventory level dependent demand. Int J Prod Econ. 2013;142(2):381-387. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpe.2012.11.001

 

  1. Wei J, Tang J. Analysis on the Stackelberg game model and risk sharing based on buyback contract. J Theor Appl Inf Technol. 2013;48(2):1025-1031.

 

  1. Zhang Y, Yu P, Feng T. Full quantity or full credit? Choosing the right buyback. Manuf Serv Oper Manag. 2024;26(6):2212-2230. doi: 10.1287/msom.2023.0574

 

  1. Zhao Y, Wang S, Cheng TCE, Yang X, Huang Z. Coordination of supply chains by option contracts: A cooperative game theory approach. Eur J Oper Res. 2010;207(2):668-675. doi: 10.1016/j.ejor.2010.05.027

 

  1. He ZJ, Wang YL, Xu SW. Study on buyback contract with competition between multiple loss-averse retailers. Math Econ. 2010;2:45-52. doi: 10.3968/8104

 

  1. Hennet JC, Arda Y. Supply chain coordination: A game-theory approach. Eng Appl Artif Intell. 2008;21(3):399-405. doi: 10.1016/j.engappai.2007.04.001

 

  1. Guardiola LA, González MA, Ortega F. Cooperation and profit allocation in distribution chains: New developments and applications of cooperative game theory. Omega. 2024;123:103021. doi: 10.1016/j.omega.2024.103021

 

  1. Guardiola LA, González MA, Ortega F. Cooperative profit allocation in distribution chains: A game-theoretic approach. Eur J Oper Res. 2023;309(2):789-803. doi: 10.1016/j.ejor.2023.03.009

 

  1. Von Neumann J, Morgenstern O. Theory of Games and Economic Behavior. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press; 1944.

 

  1. Nash JF. Equilibrium points in n-person games. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1950;36(1):48-49. doi: 10.1073/pnas.36.1.48

 

  1. Kuhn HW. Extensive games and the problem of information. In: Kuhn HW, Tucker AW, editors. Contributions to the Theory of Games. Vol. 2. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press; 1953. p. 193-216.

 

  1. Aumann RJ. Acceptable points in general cooperative n-person games. In: Tucker AW, Luce RD, editors. Contributions to the Theory of Games. Vol. 4. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press; 1959. p. 287-324.

 

  1. Shubik M. Incentives, decentralized control, the assignment of joint costs and internal pricing. Manag Sci. 1962;8(3):325-343. doi: 10.1287/mnsc.8.3.325

 

  1. Vickrey W. Counter speculation, auctions, and competitive sealed tenders. J Finance. 1961;16(1):8-37. doi: 10.2307/2977633

 

  1. Winston WL. Operations Research: Applications and Algorithms. 4th ed. Boston, MA: Duxbury Press; 2003.

 

  1. Shapley LS. A value for n-person games. In: Kuhn HW, Tucker AW, editors. Contributions to the Theory of Games. Vol. 2. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press; 1953. p. 307-318.
Share
Back to top
Supply Chain Management Research, Published by AccScience Publishing