COVID-19 and E-Commerce Operations: Evidence from Alibaba

Published Online:https://doi.org/10.1287/msom.2021.1075

References

  • Acemoglu D, Autor DH, Lyle D (2004) Women, war, and wages: The effect of female labor supply on the wage structure at midcentury. J. Political Econom. 112(3):497–551.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Adda J (2016) Economic activity and the spread of viral diseases: Evidence from high frequency data. Quart. J. Econom. 131(2):891–941.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Adulyasak Y, Benomar O, Chaouachi A, Cohen MC, Khern-am-nuai W (2020) Data analytics to detect panic buying and improve products distribution amid pandemic. Working paper.Google Scholar
  • Alexander D, Karger E (2020) Do stay-at-home orders cause people to stay at home? Effects of stay-at-home orders on consumer behavior. Working Paper No. 2020-12, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.Google Scholar
  • Alibaba (2019) Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. annual report, https://otp.investis.com/clients/us/alibaba/SEC/sec-outline.aspx?FilingId=13476929&Cik=0001577552&PaperOnly=0&HasOriginal=1.Google Scholar
  • Andersen AL, Hansen ET, Johannesen N, Sheridan A (2020) Consumer responses to the COVID-19 crisis: Evidence from bank account transaction data. Working paper.Google Scholar
  • Badger E, Parlapiano A (2020) The rich cut their spending. That has hurt all the workers who count on it. New York Times (June 17), https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/17/upshot/coronavirus-spending-rich-poor.html.Google Scholar
  • Baker SR, Farrokhnia RA, Meyer S, Pagel M, Yannelis C (2020) How does household spending respond to an epidemic? Consumption during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. Rev. Asset Pricing Stud. 10(4):834–862.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Bandiera O, Barankay I, Rasul I (2005) Social preferences and the response to incentives: Evidence from personnel data. Quart. J. Econom. 120(3):917–962.Google Scholar
  • Bartik AW, Bertrand M, Cullen Z, Glaeser EL, Luca M, Stanton C (2020) The impact of COVID-19 on small business outcomes and expectations. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 117(30):17656–17666.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Bary E (2020) Alibaba sees growth of its business-to-business platform accelerate amid COVID-19. MarketWatch (May 20), https://www.marketwatch.com/story/alibaba-sees-growth-of-its-business-to-business-platform-accelerate-amid-covid-19-2020-05-20.Google Scholar
  • Benzell S, Collis A, Nicolaides C (2020) Rationing social contact during the COVID-19 pandemic: Transmission risk and social benefits of US locations. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 117(30):17656–17666.Google Scholar
  • Betcheva L, Erhun F, Jiang H (2020) Supply chain thinking in healthcare: Lessons and outlooks. Manufacturing Service Oper. Management 23(6):1333–1353.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Bian B, Li J, Xu T, Foutz N (2022) Individualism during crises. Rev. Econom. Statist. 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1162/rest\_a\_01107.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Brynjolfsson E, Hu Y, Rahman MS (2009) Battle of the retail channels: How product selection and geography drive cross-channel competition. Management Sci. 55(11):1755–1765.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Cao X, Zhang D (2020) The impact of forced intervention on AI adoption. Preprint, submitted September 16, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3640862.Google Scholar
  • Cao X, Zhang D, Huang L (2020) The impact of COVID-19 on labor supply and gender gap: Evidence from a gig economy platform. Working paper.Google Scholar
  • Chen H, Qian W, Qiang W (2021) The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on consumption: Learning from high-frequency transaction data. AEA Papers Proc. 111:307–311.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Chetty R, Friedman JN, Hendren N, Stepner M (2020) Real-time economics: A new platform to track the impacts of COVID-19 on people, businesses, and communities using private sector data. Working paper, Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government, Harvard Kennedy School, Cambridge, MA.Google Scholar
  • Chronopoulos DK, Lukas M, Wilson JO (2020) Consumer spending responses to the COVID-19 pandemic: An assessment of Great Britain. Preprint, submitted April 28, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3586723.Google Scholar
  • Cohen MA, Lee HL (2020) Designing the right global supply chain network. Manufacturing Service Oper. Management 22(1):15–24.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Cohen M, Jacquillat A, Serpa J (2019) A field experiment on airline lead-in fares. Working paper.Google Scholar
  • Cohen M, Fiszer MD, Ratzon A, Sasson R (2022) Incentivizing commuters to carpool: A large field experiment with Waze. Manufacturing Service Oper. Management. Forthcoming.Google Scholar
  • Columbus L (2020) How COVID-19 is transforming e-commerce. Forbes (April 28), https://www.forbes.com/sites/louiscolumbus/2020/04/28/how-covid-19-is-transforming-e-commerce/#7fa5da433544.Google Scholar
  • Cui R, Ding H, Zhu F (2021) Gender inequality in research productivity during the COVID-19 pandemic. Manufacturing Service Oper. Management ePub ahead of print June 16, https://pubsonline.informs.org/doi/abs/10.1287/msom.2021.0991.Google Scholar
  • Cui R, Li M, Li Q (2020a) Value of high-quality logistics: Evidence from a clash between SF Express and Alibaba. Management Sci. 66(9):3879–3902.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Cui R, Li J, Zhang DJ (2020b) Reducing discrimination with reviews in the sharing economy: Evidence from field experiments on Airbnb. Management Sci. 66(3):1071–1094.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Cui R, Zhang DJ, Bassamboo A (2019) Learning from inventory availability information: Evidence from field experiments on Amazon. Management Sci. 65(3):1216–1235.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Cui R, Sun T, Lu Z, Golden J (2020c) Sooner or later? Promising delivery speed in online retail. Preprint, submitted April 17, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3563404.Google Scholar
  • Dai T, Zaman MH, Padula WV, Davidson PM (2021) Supply chain failures amid COVID-19 signal a new pillar for global health preparedness. J. Clinical Nursing 30(1–2):e1–e3.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Dannenberg P, Fuchs M, Riedler T, Wiedemann C (2020) Digital transition by COVID-19 pandemic? The German food online retail. Tijdschrift Econom. Soc. Geografie 111(3):543–560.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • eMarketer (2019) Alibaba, JD.com lead in China, but a few others are making dents, too. Insider Intelligence/eMarketer (July 2), https://www.emarketer.com/content/alibaba-jd-com-lead-in-china-but-a-few-others-are-making-dents-too.Google Scholar
  • Fairlie RW (2020) The impact of COVID-19 on small business owners: Evidence of early-stage losses from the April 2020 current population survey. NBER Working Paper No. 27309, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA.Google Scholar
  • Fan J, Tang L, Zhu W, Zou B (2018) The Alibaba effect: Spatial consumption inequality and the welfare gains from e-commerce. J. Internat. Econom. 114:203–220.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Fang H, Wang L, Yang Y (2020) Human mobility restrictions and the spread of the novel coronavirus (2019-ncov) in China. J. Public Econom. 191:104272.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Feldman J, Zhang DJ, Liu X, Zhang N (2022) Customer choice models vs. machine learning: Finding optimal product displays on Alibaba. Oper. Res. Forthcoming.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Ferretti L, Wymant C, Kendall M, Zhao L, Nurtay A, Abeler-Dörner L, Parker M, Bonsall D, Fraser C (2020) Quantifying SARS-CoV-2 transmission suggests epidemic control with digital contact tracing. Science 368(6491):eabb6936.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Fisher M, Gallino S, Netessine S (2021) Does online training work in retail? Manufacturing Service Oper. Management 23(4):876–894.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Fisher ML, Gallino S, Xu JJ (2019) The value of rapid delivery in omnichannel retailing. J. Marketing Res. 56(5):732–748.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Gallino S, Moreno A (2014) Integration of online and offline channels in retail: The impact of sharing reliable inventory availability information. Management Sci. 60(6):1434–1451.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Gallino S, Moreno A (2019) Operations in an Omnichannel World (Springer, Cham, Switzerland).CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Gallino S, Moreno A, Stamatopoulos I (2016) Channel integration, sales dispersion, and inventory management. Management Sci. 63(9):2813–2831.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Gao X, Shi X, Guo H, Liu Y (2020) To buy or not buy food online: The impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on the adoption of e-commerce in China. PLoS One 15(8):e0237900.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Ghose A, Li B, Macha M, Sun C, Foutz NYZ (2020) Trading privacy for the greater social good: How did America react during COVID-19? Preprint, submitted June 10, https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.05859.Google Scholar
  • Glaeser EL, Jin GZ, Leyden BT, Luca M (2021) Learning from deregulation: The asymmetric impact of lockdown and reopening on risky behavior during COVID-19. J. Regional Sci. 61(4):696–709. https://doi.org/10.1111/jors.12539.Google Scholar
  • Goldfarb A, Tucker C (2020) Which retail outlets generate the most physical interactions? NBER Working Paper No. 27042, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Greenstone M, Nigam V (2020) Does social distancing matter? Preprint, submitted March 27, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3561244.Google Scholar
  • Hasanat MW, Hoque A, Shikha FA, Anwar M, Hamid ABA, Tat HH (2020) The impact of coronavirus (COVID-19) on e-business in Malaysia. Asian J. Multidisciplinary Stud. 3(1):85–90.Google Scholar
  • He Z, Hsieh CT, Song ZM (2020) Preliminary estimates of economic effect of lockdown in China. Working paper, Becker Friedman Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago.Google Scholar
  • Hendricks KB, Singhal VR (2003) The effect of supply chain glitches on shareholder wealth. J. Oper. Management 21(5):501–522.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Hendricks KB, Singhal VR (2005) Association between supply chain glitches and operating performance. Management Sci. 51(5):695–711.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Hong Y, Pavlou PA (2014) Product fit uncertainty in online markets: Nature, effects, and antecedents. Inform. Systems Res. 25(2):328–344.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Hwang EH, Nageswaran L, Cho SH (2020) Impact of COVID-19 on omnichannel retail: Drivers of online sales during pandemic. Preprint, submitted July 25, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3657827.Google Scholar
  • Jia J, Ding J, Liu S, Liao G, Li J, Duan B, Wang G, Zhang R (2020) Modeling the control of COVID-19: Impact of policy interventions and meteorological factors. Preprint, submitted March 6, https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.02985.Google Scholar
  • Kaplan EH (2020) COVID-19 scratch models to support local decisions. Manufacturing Service Oper. Management 22(4):645–655.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Lee HL, Whang S (2001) Winning the last mile of e-commerce. MIT Sloan Management Rev. 42(4):54–62.Google Scholar
  • Levi R, Rajan M, Singhvi S, Zheng Y (2020) The impact of unifying agricultural wholesale markets on prices and farmers’ profitability. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 117(5):2366–2371.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Li J, Netessine S (2020) Higher market thickness reduces matching rate in online platforms: Evidence from a quasi-experiment. Management Sci. 66(1):271–289.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Li J, Netessine S, Koulayev S (2018) Price to compete with many: How to identify price competition in high-dimensional space. Management Sci. 64(9):4118–4136.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Li H, Simchi-Levi D, Wu MX, Zhu W (2019) Estimating and exploiting the impact of photo layout in sharing economy. Preprint, submitted December 4, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3470877.Google Scholar
  • Lu SF, Lu LX (2017) Do mandatory overtime laws improve quality? Staffing decisions and operational flexibility of nursing homes. Management Sci. 63(11):3566–3585.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Lu LX, Lu SF (2019) Does nonprofit ownership matter for firm performance? Financial distress and ownership conversion of nursing homes. Preprint, submitted March 20, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3343558.Google Scholar
  • Luo J, Rong Y, Zheng H (2020) Impacts of logistics information on sales: Evidence from Alibaba. Naval Res. Logist. 67(8):646–669.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Ming L, Tunca TI (2019) Consumer equilibrium, demand effects, and efficiency in group buying. Preprint, submitted April 8, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3352047.Google Scholar
  • National Bureau of Statistics of China (2019) Statistical yearbook of China. URL http://www.stats.gov.cn/tjsj/ndsj/2019/indexeh.htm.Google Scholar
  • Netessine S (2021) What COVID teaches us about innovating fast. Financial Times (May 9), https://www.ft.com/content/4c69a6e5-8bb3-4be0-9674-11f2c21976b7.Google Scholar
  • Overby E, Forman C (2015) The effect of electronic commerce on geographic purchasing patterns and price dispersion. Management Sci. 61(2):431–453.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Qiu L, Kumar S (2017) Understanding voluntary knowledge provision and content contribution through a social-media-based prediction market: A field experiment. Inform. Systems Res. 28(3):529–546.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Qiu Y, Chen X, Shi W (2020) Impacts of social and economic factors on the transmission of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in China. J. Population Econom. 33:1127–1172.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
  • Raj M, Sundararajan A, You C (2020) COVID-19 and digital resilience: Evidence from Uber Eats. Preprint, submitted June 12, https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.07204.Google Scholar
  • Sim J, Cho D, Hwang Y, Telang R (2022) Virus shook the streaming star: Estimating the COVID-19 impact on music consumption. Marketing Sci. Forthcoming.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Sun J, Zhang D, Hu H, Van Mieghem JA (2022) Predicting human discretion to adjust algorithmic prescription: A large-scale field experiment in warehouse operations. Management Sci. Forthcoming.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Terwiesch C, Olivares M, Staats BR, Gaur V (2019) A review of empirical operations management over the last two decades. Manufacturing Service Oper. Management 22(4):656–668.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Terwiesch C, Ren ZJ, Ho TH, Cohen MA (2005) An empirical analysis of forecast sharing in the semiconductor equipment supply chain. Management Sci. 51(2):208–220.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Torry H (2020) Pandemic speeds Americans’ embrace of digital commerce. Wall Street Journal (November 15), https://www.wsj.com/articles/pandemic-speeds-americans-embrace-of-digital-commerce-11605436200.Google Scholar
  • Tucker CE, Yu S (2020) The early effects of coronavirus-related social distancing restrictions on brands. Preprint, submitted April 2, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3566612.Google Scholar
  • Xu K, Chan J, Ghose A, Han SP (2017) Battle of the channels: The impact of tablets on digital commerce. Management Sci. 63(5):1469–1492.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Zhang DJ, Dai H, Dong L, Qi F, Zhang N, Liu X, Liu Z, Yang J (2020) The long-term and spillover effects of price promotions on retailing platforms: Evidence from a large randomized experiment on Alibaba. Management Sci. 66(6):2589–2609.LinkGoogle Scholar
  • Ziobro P (2020a) Amazon to suspend delivery service that competes with UPS, FedEx. Wall Street Journal (April 7), https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-to-suspend-delivery-service-that-competes-with-ups-fedex-11586296112.Google Scholar
  • Ziobro P (2020b) FedEx, strained by coronavirus, caps how much retailers can ship from stores. Wall Street Journal (May 14), https://www.wsj.com/articles/fedex-strained-by-coronavirus-caps-how-much-retailers-can-ship-from-stores-11589454006.Google Scholar
INFORMS site uses cookies to store information on your computer. Some are essential to make our site work; Others help us improve the user experience. By using this site, you consent to the placement of these cookies. Please read our Privacy Statement to learn more.