Information Sharing Strategies in Business-to-Business E-Hubs: An Agent-Based Study

Studies show that supply chain structure is a key factor affecting information sharing. Business-to-business (B2B) e-hubs have fundamentally changed many companies' supply chain structure, from a one-to-many to a many-to-many configuration. Traditional supply chains typically center around one company, which interacts with multiple suppliers or customers, forming a one-to-many structure. B2B e-hubs, on the contrary, usually connect many buyers and sellers together, without being dominated by a single company, thus forming a many-to-many configuration. Information sharing in traditional supply chains has been studied extensively, but little attention has been paid to the same in B2B e-hubs. In this study, the authors identified and examined five information sharing strategies in B2B e-hubs. Agent performances under different information sharing strategies were measured and analyzed using an agent-based e-hub model and practical implications were discussed.