Recycling Model Selection for Electronic Products Considering Platform Power and Blockchain Empowerment

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper introduces blockchain technology into the closed-loop supply chain, through four strategies for choosing the reverse recycling model of used electronics. The results underline as the introduction of blockchain technology effectively improves the real recycling rate of waste electronics.

The added value of this work is that of highlights the important role of blockchain technology for the recycling of waste electronics, comparing different alternative scenarios.

The paper is well structured and presents interesting results. Some recommendations are suggested:
- the introduction is too long and with few bibliographical references. It would be better to make it more concise and specific on the topic addressed by the paper. Bibliographic references should also be increased and updated.

- in the literature, I suggest to quote: Marinello et al., 2021 Multi-criteria decision making approaches applied to waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE): A comprehensive literature review

- also the section “Model description and assumptions” is very long and difficult to follow. It should be summarized.

- the scenarios analyzed could be schematized with a table, so as to make it easier to understand the characteristics and properties of each

- please, check that equation 9 is correct

- integrate the description of future developments in the conclusion section

- the introduction is long and with few bibliographical references. It would be better to make it more concise and specific on the topic addressed by the paper

- also the section describing the applied model is very long and difficult to follow. It should be made more smooth and concise
- integrate the description of future developments

Author Response

Dear reviewer:

  We are very grateful to your comments and suggestions for the manuscript entitled “Recycling model selection for electronics products considering platform power and blockchain empowerment” (sustainability-1701933). Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully，summarized them  and made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked in blue in the manuscript. The main corrections of the paper and responses to reviewer comments are as follows:

Suggestion 1:

①“The introduction is too long and with few bibliographical references. It would be better to make it more concise and specific on the topic addressed by the paper. Bibliographic references should also be increased and updated. ”

②“In the literature, I suggest to quote: Marinello et al., 2021 Multi-criteria decision making approaches applied to waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE): A comprehensive literature review.”

③“The introduction is long and with few bibliographical references. It would be better to make it more concise and specific on the topic addressed by the paper.”

Response 1: In order to ensure the continuity and integrity of the introduction, we have simplified and modified the introduction in accordance with your suggestions, deleted redundant sentences and cases, and only using some major examples to support our research. Details are as follows:

Line 39-43: After 10 minutes at zero on "Double Eleven", the turnover of Huawei phones on JD.com increased by more than 100% year-on-year. In addition to the cell phone category, other digital electronic products such as high-end HiFi headphones, routers and high-end thin and light notebooks all saw multi-fold growth in sales.

Line 50-53: For example, Tmall and Taobao will hire influential celebrities and weblebrities to broadcast live to promote their products. There is the AR experience function launched by Dewu APP, which reduces the uncertainty of consumers when purchasing products online.

Line 78-80: Therefore, in order to reduce the impact of waste electronics on the environment, it is very important to properly recycle waste electronics[6]. Now, many companies have started to recycle these reusable waste electronic products.

Line 56-61: There are mainly two modes of cooperative sales between the manufacturer and platforms, namely the platform reselling model (by purchasing products from the manufacturer and selling them to buyers) and the platform agent selling model (in which the manufacturer sell their products directly to buyers). Platform agent reselling is where the platform receives a commission or a portion of sales from the manufacturer, who sells directly to the consumer [3].

We would also like to thank you for recommending excellent literature, and your recommendation of Marinello et al. is particularly relevant to our theme of recycling of waste electronics. Waste electronic products can cause serious environmental pollution if they are not disposed of properly and timely, and this is one of the main problems of our research on recycling of waste electronic products. We applied this literature from Marinello et al. in the introduction of this paper, as shown in lines 78-79 :

Therefore, in order to reduce the impact of waste electronics on the environment, it is very important to properly recycle waste electronics[6].

Suggestion 2:

①“Also the section “Model description and assumptions” is very long and difficult to follow. It should be summarized.”

②“The scenarios analyzed could be schematized with a table, so as to make it easier to understand the characteristics and properties of each.”

③“Also the section describing the applied model is very long and difficult to follow. It should be made more smooth and concise.”

Response 2: In order to ensure the integrity of the paper's research questions and model assumptions to the research discussion, we actively draw on your suggestions. We have streamlined the model description and hypothesis sections of the article and added two tables to facilitate  understanding and description of our hypothesis and model scenarios, as follows.

Line 341-349: The platform promotes the demand of the consumer market through certain marketing efforts. In the reverse recycling process, whoever does the recycling invests the corresponding recycling effort . Stackelberg differential game is played in a power structure where the manufacturer is the channel leader and the platform is the channel follower. The relevant assumptions of this paper are as follows.

We considered four different recycling models, i.e. manufacturer recycling model NM and platform recycling model NP without blockchain technology, and manufacturer recycling model BM and platform recycling model BP with blockchain empowerment. As shown in the table 2.

 Table 2. Recycling mode type.

 Line 423-425: In this case, the residual value obtained by the platform is，. (The residual value benefits obtained by the manufacturer and the platform under different recycling modes are shown in Table 3.)

 Table 3. Residual value benefits under different recovery modes.

Suggestion 3: “Please, check that equation 9 is correct. Integrate the description of future developments in the conclusion section.”

Response 3: We carefully checked equation 9 as you suggested, and found that the format of marketing effort results of equation 9 in the manufacturer recycling mode without blockchain technology is slightly different from that in other recycling modes. The changes we made are as follows：

                         （9）

Suggestion 4:

①“Integrate the description of future developments in the conclusion section.”

②“Integrate the description of future developments.”

Response 4: We have adjusted the future developments section to the Conclusion section according to your suggestion and have integrated it. See specifically lines 1207 - 1220 :

In short, the research in this paper is based on a one-to-one two-stage plat-form-based closed-loop supply chain. And solves the problems of low recycling rate of waste electronics and consumer trust with the help of the visibility and traceability of blockchain. This study is also applicable to the recycling of waste products in other industries, which can solve the problems of resource waste and environmental pollution and contribute to the long-term sustainable development. In the future, it can be considered to increase the competitive relationship of supply chain members and expand to the complex closed-loop supply chain network system of at many to many. In addition, the assumptions in this study are based on information symmetry, but in practice, enterprises tend to be more selfish reluctance to disclose their private information. Third research can consider how blockchain technology impact plat-form-based closed-loop supply chains in the presence of information asymmetry. The future research can consider the impact of using blockchain technology on forward selling and reverse recycling processes when remanufactured products are unequal to new products.

Finally, we appreciate for Reviewer’s enthusiastic work earnestly, and hope that the correction will meet with approval. Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.

Yours sincerely,

Xue Wang, Deqing Ma, Jinsong Hu

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper focuses on proposing a dynamic platform in the closed loop supply chain for both a manufacturer and online platform. The scope of this study is well-defined to evaluate supply chain performance in recycling using game theory concept. In the study, four different game models were used for recycling platform evaluation with blockchain technology. Overall, this is very good paper. However, there are some suggestions for improving the paper as follows:

1. The model has been developed to evaluate recycling processes. The authors should consider to discuss what are the assumptions used for modelling and how does it impact on the model accuracy.
2. Case application is missing in this paper, it would be good to use a real world application to demonstrate the usefulness of the developed model in recycling and how it can influence the supply chain performance as a whole.
3. What are the differences between the existing model used in literature and proposed model? The authors should consider to tabulate a comparative study table to demonstrate clearly the significant differences and make a clear statement, e.g., what are key contributions of the models in terms of theoretical and practical aspects?
4. Electronic products – what does it mean high value product? The authors need to define clearly and think about product obsolesces and upgrade issues due shorter lifecycle for those electronic products.
5. How about the reliability aspects for those manufactured products? Quality related issue is one of the important aspects to be considered for recycling operations. Etc.

Author Response

Dear reviewer:

  We are very grateful to your comments and suggestions for the manuscript entitled “Recycling model selection for electronics products considering platform power and blockchain empowerment” (sustainability-1701933). Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked in blue in the manuscript. The main corrections to the paper and responses to the reviewers' comments and explanations are as follows:

Suggestion 1: “The model has been developed to evaluate recycling processes. The authors should consider to discuss what are the assumptions used for modelling and how does it impact on the model accuracy.”

Response 1: The modeling assumption in this paper is that the real recycling rate and the theoretical recycling rate are not consistent, which can create a distrust problem among consumers regarding the recycling of waste products and thus reduce brand goodwill, as specified in lines 361-369 . Blockchain technology plays a circumvention role in which the real recovery rate and the theoretical recovery rate are aligned. This modeling assumption can portray the transparent and traceable nature of blockchain. It plays an important role in monitoring the recycling process. We give a practical example in the middle part of the introduction, specifically in lines 120-124, by which we can demonstrate that the modeling in this paper is realistic. This modeling can reflect more realistically the role of blockchain in solving the problem of inconsistency between the real and theoretical recycling rates of waste electronics. In this case, the modeling can be used to analyze the conditions of blockchain implementation and further explore the problem of recycler selection under blockchain implementation.

Line 361-369：When the recycler does not implement the blockchain, represents the ratio of the actual recycling volume of waste electronic products to the theoretical recycling volume, namely, the real recycling rate.represents a false ratio. This false recycling will make consumers who return waste products distrust the recycling party, thereby dampening the goodwill of the product brand. When the recycler implements the blockchain, the recycling process of waste electronic products is made more transparent by utilizing the visibility and traceability of the blockchain technology. It can effectively supervise the recycling process of waste electronic products, so that the actual recycling amount is consistent with the theoretical recycling amount, that is, .

Line 120-124：For example, BASF ag in Canada has increased the recycling(The true recovery rate is almost the same as the theoretical recovery rate) utilization of plastic products and improved the circularity of its supply chain through reciChain blockchain platform. And because of reciChain's transparency, the platform can better assure brand owners that their recycling certificates are valid, thereby increasing consumer trust.

Suggestion 2: “Case application is missing in this paper, it would be good to use a real world application to demonstrate the usefulness of the developed model in recycling and how it can influence the supply chain performance as a whole.”

Response 2: We actively adopt to your suggestions and demonstrate the validity of the model through practical cases. We listed several practical cases in the middle of the introduction. Companies that do not use blockchain technology or the entire product market has a very low true recovery rate without the use of blockchain technology. In contrast, companies using blockchain technology effectively increase the real recovery rate of their products (the true recovery is almost identical to the theoretical recovery). See lines 103-124 for details.

Line 103-124: In addition to the choice of recycling model, the opaque recycling process, lax supervision and other problems easily affect consumers' trust in the recycling of waste products. Consumers returned used products, but not all of them reached the manu-facturer, and the actual recycling of waste products was far less than the theoretical recycling. It is reported that in 2020, the theoretical recycling amount of lithium ion batteries in The Chinese market reached 478,000 tons, but the actual recycling amount was only 196,000 tons, accounting for only 41% of the theoretical recycling amount. Such false recycling problems will cause consumers to no longer trust the product, which can affect the brand goodwill of the product and reduce consumers' willingness to recycle.

In fact, the effective recycling of waste electronic products restricts the key bottleneck of recycling waste electronic products. As a distributed accounting technology, blockchain has the characteristics of visibility, tamper-proof, traceability, decentralization and high reliability of the system, which can verify transactions on peer-to-peer networks and achieve security, transparency, low transaction costs and automation of transactions [7-9]. We can increase the trust of consumers by using the visibility and traceability features of blockchain technology to enable real and effective recycling of waste products. At present, some enterprises have applied blockchain technology in the recycling process of waste products. For example, BASF ag in Canada has increased the recycling utilization of plastic products and improved the circularity of its supply chain through reciChain distributed ledger blockchain platform. And because of reciChain's transparency, the platform can better assure brand owners that their recycling certificates are valid, thereby increasing consumer trust.

Suggestion 3: “What are the differences between the existing model used in literature and proposed model? The authors should consider to tabulate a comparative study table to demonstrate clearly the significant differences and make a clear statement, e.g., what are key contributions of the models in terms of theoretical and practical aspects?”

Response 3: Following your suggestion, we have compared the model or features of this paper with the previous articles listed in Table 1. See lines 330-333 for details. The theoretical and practical contributions of this paper are mainly summarized in the latter part of the introduction and in the management insights section of the conclusion. Specifically in lines 156-165 and 1180-1206.

Line 330-333: In order to sort out the studies related to this paper and highlight the contributions of this paper, some representative articles are listed, compared and analyzed in Table 1, as follows.

Table 1. Comparison of some relavant literature.

Line 156-165：Our paper contributes to both practical operation and theoretical research. In terms of theoretical research, it helps to further sublimate the research of closed-loop supply chain under new technology (platform) and fills the research gap of platform having both sales and recycling functions in platform-based closed-loop supply chain. In terms of practical operation, when the cost of introducing blockchain is between two thresholds and the manufacturer choose the manufacturer recycling model, the plat-form can benefit from it, the supply chain can reach coordination, and the triple bene-fits of economic, environment and social can be improved. It provides some reference for how enterprises can better improve their economic efficiency and fulfill their social responsibility with the help of blockchain technology.

Line 1180-1206：This paper highlights the important role of blockchain technology for the recycling of waste electronics. It considers the recycling function of the platform on the basis of platform resell, and analyzes the impact of blockchain technology on the selection of recycling model (manufacturer recycling/platform recycling) for waste electronics in a platform-based closed-loop supply chain. Filling in this aspect of the study and providing some valuable management insights for relevant enterprises and personnel, as follows.

For electronics manufacturers, the recycling of waste electronics will reduce the waste of resources and environmental pollution and other conditions, which is the specific performance of enterprises to fulfill their social responsibility. It has a high economic and social value and plays an important role in promoting long-term sustainable development. Blockchain technology can make the whole process of supply chain more transparent through its visibility and traceability features. Manufacturers can leverage blockchain technology in the process of reverse recycling electronics for better regulation and recycling. However, manufacturers have to consider its construction costs when using blockchain technology to further achieve improvement of “triple benefits” while increasing profits.

For online platforms, blockchain technology can increase the real recycling rate of waste electronics, increase consumer trust and reduce the impact of false recycling rates on brand goodwill, thereby expanding the market scale. However, the platform only receives a portion of the residual value of the recycled waste electronics, so it can barely make up for the higher cost of blockchain self-construction. Therefore, in the closed-loop supply chain using blockchain technology, the platform is not involved in the reverse recycling process, and the platform will benefit from the manufacturer's recycling. In the positive sales process, the platform should give full play to its unique "platform power". Leveraging the network effect of its own channels or adopting online marketing to expand the potential demand of the consumer market, increase the sales volume of products and increase the profits of manufacturers and platforms.

Suggestion 4: “Electronic products – what does it mean high value product? The authors need to define clearly and think about product obsolesces and upgrade issues due shorter lifecycle for those electronic products.”

Response 4: In this paper, the high value of electronic products refers to the high recycling value, electronic products with rapid replacement, environmental pollution and resource reuse triple attributes. Therefore, for waste electronic products, it is more important to pay attention to its recycling. The detailed description is in lines 67-81. And, in order to portray the relationship between the platform and the product brand manufacturer and the real scenario of selling electronic products, we have investigated many sources that show that the reselling model is often used when selling electronic products on the platform. Therefore, this paper assumes that the sales contract taken between the manufacturer and the platform is a resale contract in the modeling process. And based on this, we further go to explore the recycling model selection of used electronics with blockchain implementation conditions.

Line 67-81：Electronics are different from general durable products. With the rapid develop-ment of electronic technology, the replacement of electronic products is extremely fast. Although it can bring us an improvement in the quality of life, the frequency of elimination is higher than that of other products. If the discarded electronic products cannot be disposed of in time, it will bring serious pollution damage to the ecological environment. For example, lead in televisions, arsenic, mercury and other harmful sub-stances contained in computers are extremely harmful to the environment. However, there are many reusable and even non-renewable resources in waste electronic products, such as aluminum alloys in computer hard drives, and lithium or nickel-metal hydride batteries in communication tools, which can be recycled and reused. Electronic products are products with high recycling value, which have three attributes of fast replacement, environmental pollution and resource reuse. Therefore, in order to reduce the impact of waste electronics on the environment, it is very important to properly recycle waste electronics[6]. Now, many companies have started to recycle these re-usable waste electronic products. The recycling of waste electronic products is a problem to be solved in practice and theory.

Suggestion 5: “How about the reliability aspects for those manufactured products? Quality related issue is one of the important aspects to be considered for recycling operations. Etc.”

Response 5: We follow your suggestion and in the model description we assume that the quality of the remanufactured product is the same as the quality of the new product, as described in lines 337-338.In this paper, we mainly consider the situation that the real recycling volume is not equal to the theoretical recycling volume, and use blockchain technology to increase the actual recycling volume. Regarding the quality of the product we will also add to the research outlook as an important research direction in the future and explore it in depth. See 1218-1220 for details.

Line 337-338：Assume that the quality of the remanufactured product is the same as that of the new product.

Line 1218-1220: The future research can consider the impact of using blockchain technology on forward selling and reverse recycling processes when remanufactured products are unequal to new products.

Finally, we appreciate for Reviewer’s enthusiastic work earnestly, and hope that the correction will meet with approval. Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.

Yours sincerely,

Xue Wang, Deqing Ma, Jinsong Hu

Author Response File: Author Response.docx