Structural Upgrading of the “Takeout War†: Modeling Analysis of the Supply Chain Game From Duopoly to Triopoly

With the rapid development of the platform economy, the food delivery industry has evolved into a multisided interactive ecosystem centered on platforms, merchants, and delivery riders. Initially, the Chinese food delivery market was dominated by competition between Meituan and Ele.me; however, with JD.com’s entry, a three-way battle for market share has emerged. This study constructs a tripartite game model of online-to-offline (O2O) food delivery under duopoly and triopoly structures. In this model, the platform first sets strategic variables such as service quality levels, merchants then formulate pricing strategies based on these variables, and riders choose service effort levels based on the incentives and order volume. Starting from key variables such as commission rate, fulfillment incentive intensity, and service quality, the model characterizes the mechanism of mutual influence among the parties’ strategies under platform dominance. Based on this mechanism, simulation models are used to plot the impact of key parameters (e.g., fulfillment cost θ and incentive intensity λ) on total three-party profits, and a comparative analysis is conducted on the overall profit performance of the food delivery supply chain under duopoly and triopoly structures. Results indicate the following: (1) Increasing incentives or reducing fulfillment costs can increase the total profit of all three parties. (2) In highly competitive environments, higher platform commission rates struggle to offset the negative effects of rising fulfillment costs and may exacerbate profit erosion. (3) Marginal platforms, such as JD Takeout, which has just entered the market, are more vulnerable to shocks in fulfillment costs. (4) Service quality improvements across different platforms affect market share differently. This study extends platform game theory to oligopolistic scenarios, providing theoretical support and practical guidance for platform companies in designing incentive mechanisms and commission policies amid intense competition.