BMW Case Study: BMW Supply Chain Management

The Ford Motor Company’s Supply Chain Management ABSTRACT The influx of foreign automobiles that flood the United States market is higher than ever before and American companies are struggling to adapt to this decrease in market share. Ford is one of the organizations that has restructured its supply chain strategy to better integrate suppliers into their system reducing cost and

The supply chain management is considered as a management concept from past two decades as the customers are concerned about timely and safe delivery. The competitiveness has been increasing among the companies to deliver the products as quickly as possible to the customers all around the world. This has made the supply chain management as a vital tool for the management. This is also measured as a competitive parameter for the companies.

A supply chain is a net work of firms. Thus, each firm in the chain should build its own supply chains to support the competitive priorities of its services or products. Two distinct designs used to competitive advantage are efficient supply chains and responsive supply chains. Efficient supply chains work best in environments where demand is highly predictable. The focus of the supply chain is on efficient flows of services and materials keeping inventories to a minimum. The firm’s competitive priorities are low-cost operations, consistent quality, and on-time delivery. Responsive supply chains designed to react quickly in order to hedge against uncertainties in demand. Work best when firms offer a great variety of services or products and demand predictability is low. Typical competitive priorities are development speed, fast delivery times, customization, variety, volume flexibility, and top quality. Tables below show the environments and design features that best suit each design.

Supply chain management is a practice that involves the planning, supervision, and implementation of strategies and controls to direct the movement of goods and services provided to customers. The intent of this essay is to incorporate a synopsis of existing literature and to provide the reader with a general understanding of how supply chain management correlates with the organizational design and structure of modern firms. The essay comprehensively reviews the components of supply chain management and their integration with functional areas within an organization. The information presented in this essay

In this world of technology and innovation even Ford Motor Company is investing in new technologies in order to improvised their supply chain management, build an environment with interaction between each department as well as suppliers in order to reduce the bridging gap between them. As it is a leader in auto market segment, needs to update and coop with time and technology periodically but due to huge competition from the Japanese auto makers like Toyota, Honda, and Nissan, Suzuki etc., who are strong and powerful with references to the supply chain process management due to which Ford market share dip compared to others as well as the sales also declined. During this time, Ford analysed the situation and thought positively and started improvement in the supply chain management.

Supply-Chain Management is the activities that procure materials and services, and transform them into intermediate goods and final products and deliver them, through a distribution system (Heizer & Render, 2011, p. 452). DELL is a computer technology corporation that develops sells, repairs and supports, computers and computer related products. DELL has realized that supply chain is becoming more and more important for the success of today’s business world and they work accordingly to keep a competitive advantage in the market. This study will examine to what extent Dell has used supply chain management to gain and retain a competitive advantage in the computer market.

Selection of outside suppliers at the initial stage was crucial. Three advantages would benefit from authorized supplier involvement in design and production process. Firstly, they could foresee major problems in the design cycle by pulling their expertise and methodologies. Secondly, this model embedded quality into BMW’s production system up and down the supply chain. Thirdly, supplier was able to realize the critical connection between quality and profit through high customer satisfaction.

Effective supply chain management can provide an important competitive advantage for a business marketer, resulting in improved communication and involvement among members of the chain, increased motivation, and decreased costs. Tracking the movement of and demand for components used to manufacture a product across a variety of potential and actual suppliers, provides insight and the ability to respond instantly to shortages, surpluses, and changes in market conditions. It seeks to optimize production, decrease manufacturing time, minimize inventory, streamline order fulfillment, and reduce cost.

I take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks and deep gratitude to all those people who extended their whole hearted co-operation and have helped me in completing this project successfully.

Supply chain management (SCM) is a core part of organizational effectiveness in order to achieve goals characterizes efficiency. Globalization and international agreement led Toyota to develop it is SCM process to increase outsourcing supply raw materials from foreign market that are low cost and high quality.

Unique position in automotive industry: there is public excitement for the vehicles Tesla manufactures. Tesla has a climbing interest among investors as that population continues to grow and the company’s value is increasing with the development of a sound financial strategy for future value. The intangible appeal of the Tesla car product is the high-value of a new company projecting market confidence.

List of Illustrations. Cover Images. Authors own, taken November 19th 2008. Figure 1. BMW Website Image, retrieved December 5th 2008. Figure 2. BMW Website Image, retrieved December 5th 2008. Figure 3. BMW Art Car, designed by Alexander Calder, 1976. Figure 4. BMW Art Car, designed by Alexander Calder, 1976. Figure 5. BMW Headquarters Building, Munich, 1972. Figure 6. BMW Headquarters Building, Munich, 1972. Figure 7. BMW Central Building, Leipzig, East Germany, 2005. Figure 8. BMW Welt, Munich, 2006. Figure 9. Travel case from the BMW Accessory line. Figure 10. Key ring from the BMW Accessory line. Figure 11. BMW Welt, Munich, 2006. Figure 12. BMW Welt, Munich, 2006. Figure 13. Interior of BMW Welt ‘Double Cone’. Figure 14. Interior of BMW Welt, specifically BMW Premiere area. Figure 15. BMW Central Building, Leipzig, East Germany, 2005. Figure

BMW is currently the 1st most valuable car brand in the world and the 23rd most valuable brand in the world; in 2011 it was the 2nd right behind Toyota. BMW’s brand value increased 10% while Toyota’s brand value decreased by 10%. It currently own “Rolls-Royce Motor Cars” which is a British manufacturer of luxury automobiles and “MINI” which is a British automotive marque which specializes in small cars.

The aim of this thesis is to present the findings along with the challenges and the ways to tackle them while implementing Lean and Inventory Control in Mass Customized Environment.

Series, 3 Series, 5 Series, 6 Series, 7 Series, X3 SUV, X5 SUV, X6 SUV, Z4 (Roadster), and M. The