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Title Leasing, Modularity, and the Circular Economy
ID_Doc 786
Authors Agrawal, V; Atasu, A; Ülkü, S
Title Leasing, Modularity, and the Circular Economy
Year 2021
Published Management Science, 67, 11
DOI 10.1287/mnsc.2020.3829
Abstract We investigate the economic and environmental implications of jointly implementing leasing and modularity, two prominent circular economy strategies, and their interaction. We develop a durable goods model to obtain insights for firms considering the use of these strategies. We first analyze the effect of adopting leasing on a firm's product architecture choice. We find that a modular product architecture is more attractive under leasing only if off-lease products depreciate to a greater extent. We next analyze the effect of adopting a modular product architecture on the firm's business model choice. We find that adopting a modular architecture can cause a leasing firm to switch to selling but will not lead a selling firm to switch to leasing. Building on these results, we show that leasing a modular product is preferred by the firm only under limited conditions (i.e., when production costs are low, off-lease products are in relatively better condition, and when there is a large difference between depreciation levels of different modules). Finally, we show that jointly implementing leasing and modularity can also lead to higher environmental impact than only adopting leasing or modularity in isolation.
Author Keywords sustainable operations; circular economy; modularity; durable goods; leasing
Index Keywords Index Keywords
Document Type Other
Open Access Open Access
Source Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED); Social Science Citation Index (SSCI)
EID WOS:000719120400008
WoS Category Management; Operations Research & Management Science
Research Area Business & Economics; Operations Research & Management Science
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