Introduction
Technological advancements that have happened from the turn of the 21st century to date have revolutionized how businesses relate with their customers. Consequently, business-to-customer (B2C) relationships have been affected. E-commerce, which refers to the completion of business transactions online, is one area of B2C engagement affected by the trend. Particularly, last-mile delivery options, which are part of the multiplicity of transport and logistics services offered by e-commerce companies to their customers, have been significantly impacted by the same trend as well (Pålsson, Pettersson, and Hiselius, 2017). For example, e-commerce firms have developed innovative solutions to deliver goods to customers using same-day delivery options, which exploit existing transportation capabilities of logistics companies to improve service delivery (Bhattacharjya et al., 2018). More innovative solutions have been implemented in other areas of transport and logistics planning.
Based on the above-mentioned developments, progress has been made to promote e-commerce growth through the adoption of innovative techniques in service delivery. These areas of service improvements have enhanced the profile of e-commerce as a formidable business platform for contemporary firms (Eschenbach, 2017). However, differences in factors that affect technology adoption and the use of innovative solutions across developing and developed markets mean that the benefits of last-mile efficiency gains may vary across regions. Furthermore, the presence of differences in logistics capabilities in various parts of the world means that delivery efficiency gains may be skewed towards propping certain markets or demographics at the expense of others.
It is important to understand innovative solutions that increase last-mile delivery efficiency because e-commerce development is rapidly reshaping the structure of modern economies. Furthermore, as the world moves towards adopting more innovative solutions to address current market-related problems, the impact of e-commerce development will be more profound across most sectors of the economy. In this regard, there is a need to comprehend how different countries will cope with these changes to better prepare them to exploit existing opportunities of market development for their citizens.
This approach to learning will better distribute the efficiency of last-mile delivery in e-commerce development across developed and developing countries. It will also promote equity in e-commerce growth and development across nations, thereby reducing existing inequalities across regions and societies. Thus, e-commerce growth is an expanding area of research that needs more attention from policymakers, practicing managers, and academicians because they are centers of knowledge development and application involved in implementing innovative solutions to improve B2C relationships.
The present study is important to scholars because it will play a crucial role in expanding the body of knowledge in the research area. Consequently, practitioners in different business-related fields will understand the background of implementing practical policy proposals to improve the effectiveness of innovative solutions in e-commerce. Based on the structure of investigations highlighted in this document, the insights provided in this review will also increase last-mile delivery options for B2C customers in developed and developing countries.
Outline of the Topic
Explanation of Topic
Last-mile delivery is an important aspect of e-commerce growth and development because it defines the last point of contact between businesses and their customers. In this regard, customer experiences are defined by the quality of last-mile delivery services. Based on the importance of these services to B2C relationships, it is pertinent to optimize them through innovation to get the best results. However, doing so depends on the proper understanding of contextual factors influencing the optimization process in the first place. From this background, the need to understand differences in developing and developed countries is founded. As highlighted in section 1.0 above, policymakers, practicing managers, and academicians should pay attention to this area of research because they control information exchange options, which drive e-commerce growth.
Current uncertainties in the global environment regarding the future of businesses in a volatile business environment make this research investigation timely because companies are gradually remodeling their structures to fit the e-commerce business framework. This change is occasioned by the resilience of the e-commerce model in overcoming some of the supply chain disruptions associated with the brick-and-mortar business model. Therefore, more companies are transitioning from the traditional business structure where customers make physical visits to store locations to have an online presence where they can communicate with them virtually and deliver goods and services to them remotely. These changes mean that there is a rapid pace of offline and online business integration, which is happening in the 21st century. The developments imply that this investigation is timely and relevant to the current macro-environment affecting e-commerce. Therefore, understanding the role of innovative solutions in increasing last-mile delivery efficiency for B2C relationships in developing and developed countries would help companies to improve their operational and logistical capabilities to handle the high volume of e-commerce businesses expected in the future.
Outline of Methods
The evidence to be analyzed in this paper will be obtained through a narrative review of research articles published within the last five years (2015-2020). The goal of adopting this strategy in the data collection plan is to get the most updated information regarding the research issue. All the journals sampled in the investigation will be empirical for the articles to be included in the review, in the sense that their findings will have to be based on primary research data. The journals were retrieved from databases outlined in the ABS list.
Keywords and phrases used to retrieve peer-reviewed articles included “innovation,” “last-mile delivery,” and “e-commerce.” The initial search yielded 3,498 articles from multiple journals. After excluding materials that were published before the year 2015, this number declined to 1,599. These articles were later analyzed to identify empirical data by investigating the methodologies used by the researchers. Consequently, 1,344 articles were excluded from the final count of studies to be sampled. This reduction of the number means that the study did not accommodate articles that did not have empirical data. After implementing this exclusion criterion, 255 articles remained for further analysis. These papers were further scrutinized based on their relevance to the research topic. Particularly, the assessment was subject to their relevance to making improvements in last-mile delivery services. After implementing this exclusion criterion, 32 articles were left for review. These materials formed the final sample of research articles that were analyzed in this document.
Critical Reflection on Methods
As explained in section 2.0 above, the narrative method was used to review the research materials sampled in this study. This type of review differs from the systematic technique because it collates the findings of different research articles to identify gaps in literature and opportunities for further investigation. Its interpretive-qualitative nature also helps in the identification of inconsistencies in research data, which could be further investigated with the view of streamlining existing findings with past data (Onwuegbuzie and Frels, 2016). Nonetheless, the main justification for adopting the narrative review method is its suitability in conducting exploratory research topics, such as the present study. Comparatively, the systematic review method is applicable in research contexts where there is a specific question to be answered.
The limitation of using the narrative review method, as opposed to the systematic review technique, is the lack of quality assessments attached to the research articles sampled. This feature is often present in systematic reviews, thereby elevating its reliability and validity over that of narrative reviews (Boland, Cherry, and Dickson, 2017). This statement means that the same benefit is not accorded to the narrative review method, thereby limiting its reliability. The ambiguity associated with this type of analysis also makes it difficult to generalize its findings across a large population or region. Overall, the narrative technique will be used to investigate the methodologies adopted by the authors of the 32 articles selected for analysis. This information will be provided in the next section of this paper and will be part of a broader analysis of how the authors adopted the qualitative, quantitative, or mixed-method techniques in developing the sampled research papers. Furthermore, the articles will be categorized into different themes, based on their relevance to the research topic.
Literature Review
Introduction
This section of the paper contains an analysis of the literature mentioned in section 3.0 above. The evidence gathered from the investigation will be presented in a tabular format to highlight key areas of interest associated with the articles sampled. This tabular structure of review will be adopted for the analysis because it is the most common framework used for undertaking reviews (Onwuegbuzie and Frels, 2016). Furthermore, it encourages researchers to be analytical about their subject of investigation, thereby enabling them to avoid a descriptive prescription of a research issue. However, before delving into the details surrounding the use of this data analysis method, it is first important to understand existing criteria for classifying developed and developing countries.
Criteria for Classifying Developed and Developing Nations
It is important to understand the differences between developing and developed countries because firms cannot effectively assimilate new knowledge in last-mile delivery options without having the absorptive capacity, which is likely determined by the political, social, and economic characteristics of a state. Country classification in international business is undertaken by evaluating different measures of social, political, and economic development. However, this ordering system is not always adopted in a dichotomous manner because some researchers use a trifecta understanding of country classification, which is defined by the presence of the above-mentioned classification criteria (developed and developing nations) as well as an intermediary grouping of “economies in transition” (Gligor, Tan and Nguyen, 2018). Other researchers suggest that economies that are in transition could possess characteristics of both developed and developing economies (Gruchmann and Seuring, 2018). However, this statement is contentious because it is difficult to determine the right criteria for reviewing the attributes of intermediary economies that fall in the developing or developed criteria for national economies.
Each of the criteria of classification identified above also has subcategories, which are defined by ad hoc criteria of national positionings, such as the great seven (G7) countries or geographical positionings, such as western countries and eastern nations. Researchers who have used the geographical criterion to describe developing economies consider Africa, Asia, and South American countries as falling in this category (Kanyoma, Agbola, and Oloruntoba, 2018). Comparatively, developed countries have been classified as those in North America and Western Europe (Gruchmann and Seuring, 2018). This classification system will be used as the main criterion for defining developing and developed countries. It is adopted in this study because last-mile delivery services are highly dependent on geographical and spatial location positioning to optimize delivery outcomes. Therefore, it is justifiable to use a geographically-based measure for defining developing and developed economies.
Last-Mile Delivery
The delivery of goods from a central transport hub to a customer’s final home destination is one of the biggest challenges affecting e-commerce businesses. Particularly, the last stage of delivery, which is referred to as the “last-mile delivery” is the most difficult stage to complete in the service delivery model because it outlines the point of contact between businesses and their customers (Treiblmaier et al., 2020). Furthermore, this last point of contact between businesses and their clients is the least efficient to manage in the overall service delivery model of e-commerce enterprises because it accounts for about 40% of the overall costs associated with transportation and distribution (Ignat and Chankov, 2020). The importance of last-mile delivery strategies to a company’s overall cost structure explains why B2C relationships are central to this investigation. However, they are affected by several challenges, including lack of transparency potential for cost escalations, low-efficiency levels, and poor infrastructure (Treiblmaier et al., 2020). However, these issues do not negate the fact that shipping goods using freight remains the most cost-effective and efficient mode of logistics management in e-commerce businesses (Lirn, Wu and Mondragon, 2018; Wang, Rodrigues and Evans, 2015).
The last mile-delivery aspect of logistics chain supply is also a complicated aspect of logistics supply management because of the difficulty in guaranteeing the safety of delivered packages once they are left at a customer’s doorstep. Researchers have documented weather concerns and theft as being two of the most commonly reported incidences involving such deliveries (Ewedairo, Chhetri, and Jie, 2018; Hsiao et al., 2018; Zissis, Aktas, and Bourlakis, 2018). These risky areas of logistics performance management heighten the importance of looking for effective ways of improving the efficiency of last-mile delivery systems.
Cost concerns have also been highlighted as being one of the most commonly mentioned issues in the management of last-mile delivery systems. In light of this realization, companies have invested a lot of money in new technology to look for new ways to cut costs of delivery and remain competitive (Kabadurmus, 2020). This strategic approach to efficiency improvement has not only been witnessed in the retail and e-commerce sectors but also in the aviation industry as airlines buy newer aircraft with better technology to improve their efficiency records and remain competitive.
In the context of logistics and supply management, the use of autonomous vehicles and drones to optimize logistical capabilities have been cited as the most commonly mentioned pieces of technology in the last-mile delivery system (Wang et al., 2018a). Leading technology companies such as Alibaba and Amazon have invested in new research to experiment with the use of drones for making home deliveries (Wang et al., 2018a). Automated parcel delivery methods are also in their infancy stages of research development, with initial projections suggesting that it could reduce the cost of delivery by up to 24% (Wang et al., 2018b). This figure should be refined as more evidence is tabled after undertaking more research.
Most of the technological developments witnessed in the area of last-mile delivery have come from the immense pressure put on e-commerce companies to provide safe and same-day delivery services for their customers. The surge in demand for e-commerce shipments has further increased the pressure on shippers to accommodate a variety of product consignments to meet this requirement (Mir et al., 2018). These changes to the system are a reflection of the inefficiencies that exist in it that are being stretched by the rising demand for e-commerce businesses in the 21st century. Some researchers suggest that companies are “playing catch-up” in expanding their resource capabilities to meet current market requirements (Ewedairo, Chhetri, and Jie, 2018; Hsiao et al., 2018; Zissis, Aktas, and Bourlakis, 2018). Others are of the opinion that most markets are not ready to absorb new logistics capabilities, in terms of affordability or sustainability and therefore lag behind others by default (Martins et al., 2020).
The efficiencies of last-mile delivery systems have been recently compounded by the growth of e-commerce sales, which has brought a dramatic surge in the number of parcel deliveries per day (Cagliano et al., 2017). Researchers claim that this increase in business activities has been fuelled by changing customer expectations and an increased understanding of e-commerce across various markets (Taylor et al., 2019; Gruchmann et al., 2019). The convenience brought by online shopping as well as its cost-effective nature has boosted sales in the short term, further heightening customer expectations about the benefits of same-day shipping, such as free delivery (Ma, 2017). The rise of urban populations has contributed to this trend because traffic congestion and other transport-related problems are avoided through physical deliveries on e-commerce platforms (Cagliano et al., 2017).
The link between e-commerce and urbanization has prompted some researchers to investigate how urban transport linkages can be used to optimize home deliveries (Tsai and Pawar, 2018; Cichosz, Wallenburg, and Knemeyer, 2020). However, inefficiencies in the system are often observed at the last-mile delivery point where multiple stops with low drop sizes often inhibit the ability of companies to operate efficiently (Tsai and Pawar, 2018; Cichosz, Wallenburg and Knemeyer, 2020). Consequently, the number of researchers who have tried to explore the efficacy of different solutions for managing such problems has increased. It is from this background that the current need to understand innovative solutions in the market is derived from. This statement formed the background for the literature review plan, which yielded 32 research articles analyzed below.
Analysis of the Literature
As highlighted in section 3.0 above, two themes were used to undertake the analysis. The first one contextualized the literature into those that are based on empirical investigations conducted in developed countries and the other one was grounded on similar studies conducted in developing countries. Their findings will later be used in subsequent sections of this document to assess innovative solutions for increasing last-mile delivery options for B2C customers in the e-commerce space. As highlighted in Table 1 below, 20 articles were based on empirical investigations domiciled in developed countries.
Table 1. Developed Countries
As shown in Table 1 above, 20 articles sampled in the review were based on empirical investigations in developed countries, which means that these articles were done in the United States of America (USA), Italy, United Kingdom (UK), Sweden, Norway, and Germany. These articles focused on the retail and logistics section of the economy as the main sector for conducting the investigations. It was supplemented by some research studies that used computer modeling techniques to develop the findings (Caretenuto et al., 2018). Crowdsourcing and crowd shipping also emerged as alternative technologies commonly adopted by researchers who have investigated the research topic from the perspective of developed countries. Table 2 below presents findings that were relevant to develop countries.
Table 2. Developing Countries
According to table 2 above, 12 peer-reviewed articles provided pieces of evidence relating to the research topic based on empirical investigations domiciled in developing countries. In the context of this review, the main developing countries cited in the analysis included Poland, Latvia, India, China, Singapore, and Brazil. These countries acted as conduits for understanding the rate of technological development in emerging economies. They do not differ much from the classification of both developed and developing economies highlighted at the start of this review because the above-mentioned countries are some of the world’s biggest economic powerhouses of the developing world. For example, the presence of India and China in the list of developing countries should come as no surprise in this investigation because these two nations are market leaders in different areas of economic development in Asia and around the world.
Capacities for Adopting Innovative Solutions
One of the major points of differentiation between developing and developed markets is their distinguished capacities to accommodate or integrate new technology. This difference can be highlighted through the technological adoption index, which highlights varying rates of innovation adoption across countries (Janjevic, Winkenbach, and Merchán, 2019). According to the classifications of articles discussing different research issues from both perspectives of developing and developed countries, it has been established that different countries have varying rates of adopting digital solutions in last-mile delivery (Cichosz, Wallenburg, and Knemeyer, 2020). Relative to this statement, Singapore emerges as an interesting case study of analysis because it emerged as one of the countries where research on the study topic had been undertaken (Pålsson and Sandberg, 2020).
Therefore, there could be a link between the rate of technological adoption in countries with specific socioeconomic profiles and the number of times researchers used the same location to undertake their studies. To demonstrate this point, the United States (US) emerged as having the highest number of mentions among the research articles sampled, In other words, most of the articles that addressed the research issue from the perspective of developed nations did so using a sample of US-based respondents. This data collection strategy gives a lot of power to US-based journals in defining the trajectory for developing innovative solutions in the last-mile delivery process.
Current research on technological diffusion has advanced the need to understand the critical success factors for determining a firm’s or nation’s absorptive capacity for innovative solutions. From this line of reasoning, several aspects of technological knowledge transfer models have been explored, including technology diffusion channels and communication plans. The national culture of a country or a community has also been mentioned as having a moderating effect on the ability of firms to absorb new technology (Cichosz, Wallenburg, and Knemeyer, 2020). This capability is considered a competitive advantage tool because it defines how well a country or organization will recognize the value of new knowledge and use it effectively to solve market problems or outwit the competition. This statement has been built on the link between innovation and a firm’s absorptive capacity with some scholars arguing that a company’s rate of innovation is determined by its ability to expand its absorptive capacity (Janjevic, Winkenbach, and Merchán, 2019). Indeed, a country’s or firm’s absorptive capacity for new technology is dependent on prior knowledge of the technology or the social, political, and economic dynamics of the market. These characteristics have presented the concept of absorptive capacity as being cumulative to the extent that a firm can constantly invest in its capabilities in this area of competence and realize significant gains as a result.
Summary
Overall, based on the findings highlighted in this review, the objectives of the study are three-fold. One, there is a need to identify the main type of innovative solutions to increase last-mile delivery, estimate the extent that economic differences affect the adoption of innovative solutions in developed and developing countries, and predict the impact that innovative solutions would have on policymakers, practicing managers and academicians. To meet these objectives, we have reviewed and classified existing works of literature that have discussed the research topic from the perspectives of developing and developed nations. The next section of this document presents an analysis and discussion of the findings.
Analysis and Critical Discussions
Introduction
The findings highlighted in section 4.0 above suggest that the approaches used to develop innovative solutions in last-mile delivery options differ for both developing and developed countries. Different stakeholders need to be aware of the differences between both types of markets when adopting or formulating future performance solutions for B2C customers. Consequently, the implications of the findings highlighted in this study are evaluated based on their relevance and value to three groups of stakeholders: practicing managers, policymakers, and academicians.
Implications for Practicing Managers
Managers are tasked with the responsibility of making sure the day-to-day operations of a company align with its performance standards. In this regard, they are chief executive officers of such enterprises. This position gives them the power to determine the strategic direction that organizations will follow in the course of implementing strategic plans to provide last-mile delivery services (Nilsson, Sternberg, and Klaas-Wissing, 2017). This statement is also true regarding the adoption of innovative technologies to improve organizational plans. Relative to this statement, the findings highlighted in this study suggest that managers need to understand the macro-environmental contexts in that their strategic decisions will be implemented. In this regard, developing and developed economies are presented as two possible frameworks for employing innovative solutions.
By knowing the difference in macroeconomic contexts between developed and developing countries, managers should better understand the strategies to implement in specific markets and the importance of sustaining them or changing their composition to attain short-term or long-term goals. Section 2.0 of this study showed that most researchers have addressed the research issue by conducting empirical investigations in developed economies. Managers could use the data obtained from such reviews to improve last-mile delivery services for B2C customers as a test platform before implementing similar strategies in new markets. Stated differently, the evidence generated from developed markets could be used to improve last-mile delivery strategies in developing markets. For example, Huang and Ardiansyah (2019) mentioned the use of crowdsourcing as a technique for improving the efficiency of last-mile delivery services, which is a popular form of business engagement in developed, as opposed to developing countries. Therefore, the success of crowdsourcing, which has been registered in developed markets, could be used to improve similar processes in developing countries. Therefore, managers can tap into the experiences of researchers who have adopted crowdsourcing innovative technologies in mature markets to improve their last-mile delivery services in emerging ones.
Managers can also benefit from the context-specific nature of the research articles sampled in this document to gain important insights regarding their operational plans and techniques for improving performance. Particularly, in both the developed and developing countries sampled in this paper, the retail and logistics sector emerged as being the most studied industry relating to the improvement of last-mile delivery services. However, this outcome is probable because last-mile delivery is by itself a logistics activity. In the e-commerce space, it could be linked with distribution and logistics services (Janjevic, Winkenbach, and Merchán, 2019). Nonetheless, managers can benefit from the context-specific nature of the research articles by adopting their recommendations in the same industry. Stated differently, it is easy to generalize the findings of the study to most firms in the retail and logistics sector because most of the empirical investigations undertaken were domiciled in the same sector. Since few studies explored the research issue in non-retail industries, It is conversely difficult to adopt the recommendations developed in the retail industry in a non-retail sector. For example, some of the investigations that were done in the education, information communications technology, automobile, and computation delivery fields were few, thereby making it possible for the retail sector to be the most dominant industry supporting the findings sampled.
Implications to Policymakers
Innovations are often adopted or implemented within specific jurisdictional contexts. This statement means that the laws of a country or policies of an organization play an important role in determining the rate of technological adoption or extent of integration of new technologies in e-commerce (Tsai and Pawar, 2018; Seghezzi et al., 2020). As such, policymakers are important stakeholders in the formulation and integration of technological solutions to address delivery challenges in e-commerce development. The works of literature sampled in section 4.0 of this document show that the authors have proposed several innovative solutions for improving the efficacy of last-mile delivery options for B2C customers (Bjørgen, Ystmark, and Hjelkrem, 2019; Peinkofer, Schwieiterman, and Miller, 2020). The multiplicity of innovative solutions available in the market means that the rate of technological innovation is outpacing regulatory reform that should guide the adoption of these techniques and assess their efficacy in improving the efficacy of last-mile delivery options.
Subject to the rapid pace of technological innovation, policymakers should pay attention to the impact that these new technologies would have on the industry and on consumers. The independent classification of research findings across developmental lines also means that policymakers should pay attention to capacity constraints that prevent firms in developing countries fail to adopt innovations, as well as developed countries, do (Tsai and Pawar, 2018). For example, most of the articles, which discussed the use of advanced technologies, such as unmanned vehicles or autonomous delivery vehicles in delivering packages, were domiciled in developed countries (Bjørgen, Ystmark, and Hjelkrem, 2019; Peinkofer, Schwieiterman and Miller, 2020). These studies were located in these countries because they have developed the capabilities to produce and accommodate new technology.
Policymakers also need to pay attention to the legal doctrines governing decision-making processes in the two types of nations explored in this study to understand whether new legal or policy proposals on the adoption of innovative solutions would complement market development, or not. This statement draws attention to the need to understand the digital competitiveness of developed and developing countries. This index could be a reliable measure of how well innovative solutions could be adopted to increase last-mile delivery options.
The link between the digital competitiveness of nations and their geographic locations highlights the skewness that characterizes technological innovation in different countries. To demonstrate differences between the capacities of developed and developing countries to accommodate innovative solutions, a comparison could be made with the advantage that people in cities enjoy in using e-commerce compared to people who live in rural areas. In most cases, people who live in cities have greater access to opportunities for technological advancement compared to their counterparts living in rural areas. Furthermore, this difference will spread further into dictating how the two people embrace new technology (Bjørgen, Ystmark, and Hjelkrem, 2019; Peinkofer, Schwieiterman, and Miller, 2020). Typically, those who have been exposed to it are likely to adopt its features better than those who are using it for the first time. This skewness in the ability to adopt technology between different countries, markets, and firms highlights the advantage that developed countries have over their developing counterparts in embracing new innovations. Concisely, they enjoy first-mover advantages in the adoption of new technologies. However, the advantages that developed countries have over developing ones should not be a deterrent for firms in developing countries to embrace innovations for increasing the efficiency of last-mile delivery services because they also enjoy the privilege of learning from their developed counterparts.
Implications on the Academic Field
The methodology used by the authors of the peer-reviewed articles sampled in this study form the main basis for understanding the implications of the findings on the academic field. The quantitative research method was adopted in all the 32 articles sampled. this statement means that none of the researchers used the qualitative research method, in isolation. Instead, this technique was integrated with the quantitative research method in selected cases, such as in the studies authored by Zhoua et al. (2020) and Wang et al. (2020). The blending of qualitative and quantitative research methods gave rise to the use of the mixed methods research approach in preparing the above-mentioned studies. The justification for using this technique to evaluate the journals was premised on the need to evaluate both subjective and measurable variables in research.
Summary
The findings presented in this paper expand the body of knowledge regarding the adoption of innovative solutions to increase the efficiency of last-mile delivery options for B2C customers. In light of the methodology use criterion described above, the qualitative research approach emerges as a relatively underutilized approach in research development. This is an interesting observation because when analyzing B2C relationships, customer satisfaction and attitudes play a significant role in determining the efficacy of innovative solutions. These attributes are subjective in the sense that they are not measurable and subject to cultural or attitudinal differences in society (Heaslip and Kovács, 2019). The qualitative methodology is appropriately designed to assess such variables. Their findings are useful in providing directions that future researchers should follow to advance knowledge in the chosen area of study.
Conclusion
From the onset of this study, it was declared that the overall aim of this study was to find out innovative solutions for increasing the efficiency of last-mile delivery services among e-commerce B2C customers. This research aim was supported by three research objectives, which were designed to identify the main type of innovative solutions to increase last-mile delivery, estimate the extent that economic differences affect the adoption of innovative solutions in developed and developing countries, and predict the impact that innovative solutions would have on policymakers, practicing managers and academicians.
To fulfill the above-mentioned objectives, the investigation was extended to include a classification of articles that were based on empirical studies done in developed and developing countries. The main developing countries mentioned in the study included China, Singapore, India, and Poland. Comparatively, the articles sampled in this review and that related to developed markets used the United Kingdom, United States, Italy, Sweden, and Norway as examples of mature economies where empirical investigations involving the research topic were based.
One of the objectives of the study was to identify the types of innovative solutions developed to increase the efficiency of last-mile delivery options in e-commerce. The findings revealed that crowdsourcing, the use of unmanned vehicles, semi-autonomous delivery vehicles, and drones were some of the innovative solutions explored in last-mile delivery. However, several other types of innovative solutions are being developed each day to address different challenges in improving the quality of last-mile delivery services.
The focus on B2C engagement as a focal point of analysis for this investigation is also of critical importance to this analysis because it denotes the nature of interaction at the point of the last contact between a business and its customers. While this perspective of stakeholder interaction was insightful in explaining the challenges that affect the two parties in the e-commerce field, future research should focus on extending the analysis further to also include business-to-business (B2B) relationships because they are also a key part of the e-commerce business. Particularly, they are important in developing and managing successful distribution and logistics systems because they are dependent on the ability of companies to forge profitable partnerships with other business partners to complete daily deliveries. Therefore, by merging aspects of B2C and B2B engagements, it would be possible to have a holistic outlook of the type of innovative solutions to increase the efficiency of last-mile delivery services. Overall, this study demonstrates that technological advancements have created a world where distance matters less and the ability to generate new solutions is more valuable.
Learning Statement
Innovation is a universal concept adopted in different areas of business engagements across the e-commerce platform. However, in the context of this review, I found that most research articles addressed the research issue from a western perspective. Stated differently, few or scanty peer-reviewed journals have focused on adopting innovative solutions from a non-western perspective. The difference in outcomes between both sets of studies is conceivable because most structural differences that exist in the social, political, and economic makeup of developing and developed nations are replicated in this review. In other words, most of the insights gathered in this investigation, that focus on the areas of logistics and supply for e-commerce operations, are western-based. Consequently, the implications of their findings on business performance are similarly skewed towards appealing to practicing managers who have western education or are familiar with western standards of business management and operations. This is also true for policymakers because the findings of western-based studies are relevant to countries that have laws, which are based on western dogma and reasoning.
In this study, it was also found that the adoption of innovative solutions for last-mile delivery options not only addresses the need to understand the competencies and weaknesses of adopting new technology or solutions in developing and developed countries, but also the attitudinal and cultural differences that influence consumer behaviors in both sets of countries. This realization means that future research should seek to understand the impact of culture on how customers and businesses respond to innovative solutions. Furthermore, the lack of focus on the rate of adopting innovative solutions for developing countries means that future researchers should also base their investigations on more developing nations outside of the social, political, and economic makeup of most western markets. This statement implies that there is a need to undertake more investigations in regions or nations that have a fundamentally different social, political, and economic structure from those of western countries. These areas of assessment should guide the direction of future research.
Lastly, most of the studies sampled in this study, which analyzed the advancement of innovative solutions in developing countries were mostly domiciled in Asian countries. This means that there is a limited spread of empirical investigations in developing countries outside the Asian continent. Particularly, no studies investigated the adoption of innovative solutions in the Middle East and African countries, which have different social, political, and economic structures from western countries.
If I was to do the same study again, I would expand the number of databases for retrieving peer-reviewed research articles to get a broader scope of papers for review. This approach would also increase the diversity of resources available for analysis as insights from other developed and developing countries could be obtained. Consequently, there would be a richer volume of data available for review because it would be possible to compare or analyze the findings of researchers from more countries.
The expansion of the research database would also provide a broader scope of research articles to review using different research techniques because the current analysis has shown that the quantitative research method is the most preferred model for addressing the research issue. Expanding the database would provide the researcher with a more detailed review of methodologies adopted by other researchers in this field of investigation. In turn, a researcher can have the opportunity to not only review the articles from the perspective of developed vs. developing countries, but also in the context of the research methodologies adopted. Adopting this strategy means that it will be new criteria for comparing and contrasting the research articles.
Overall, the findings highlighted in this study should improve the capability of managers and policymakers to make effective decisions regarding the improvement of last-mile delivery options. The insights presented in this document are timely because there is a surge in e-commerce growth around the world as economies adopt more digitized means of completing business transactions. As highlighted in this document, this change is occasioned by the resilience of the e-commerce model in overcoming some of the supply chain disruptions associated with the brick-and-mortar business model. Therefore, more companies are transitioning from the traditional business structure where customers make physical visits to store locations to have an online presence where they can communicate with them virtually and deliver goods and services to them remotely. These changes mean that there is a rapid pace of offline and online business integration, which is happening in the 21st century. Therefore, the insights provided in this review will be valuable to new companies that want to enter the e-commerce space or for third-party players that could offer logistics solutions to online companies at the point of last-mile delivery.
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