Case Study: Control of the Supply Chain Turns Critical

Success for many organizations depends on the firm’s ability to balance product and process changes while exceeding customer expectations for improved cost delivery and quality. In lieu of these issues firms have started to implement principles of supply chain management. Supply chain management mainly involves managing the flow of incoming materials, manufacturing operations, and downstream distribution has to be in alignment that is responsive to change in customer demands eliminating a surplus of inventory.

Supply chain innovations should ensure on-shelf availability at retail outlets, improving collaboration between vendors and retailers, translating supply chain costs to product pricing, lean inventory and real time replenishment. Wal-Mart should ensure that process differentiation to determine the right method of moving products with varying demand characteristics (Akehurst, C., & Alexander, N. (1995)

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.

out for the company will be an excellent place. However, it is important to constantly assess and reassess the supply chain and remain flexible to continue to find efficiencies and implement the proper changes.

Numerous organisations have effectively executed supply chain ideas with terrific results. Proficient supply chains have empowered these firms to contend better. What were the purposes behind their triumphs? What were the obstacles these firms confronted in their excursions to accomplish joining in their systems? How were they ready to beat

For instance, the linkage between the Riordian Electric fan development management process and the Supply Chain Management process is bi-directional: on one side, the product development process feeds the Supply Chain Management process with the electric fans introduction plans and engineering change notices on bill of materials and routings, while in return the Supply Chain Management process provides the product development process with the supply chain constraints that need to be considered when scheduling the development of fans, in order to make sure that these products will hit the market at the right time. It will provide the Riordan Manufacturing an edge in the market over other rival companies. (Chase, 2006).

Simchi, D., Kaminsky, P., Shankar, R. (2008). Designing and managing the supply chain: concepts, strategies, and case studies, 3, 384-385.

To start, Schroeder, R., Goldstein, S., and Rungtusanatham define supply chain as “the set of entities and relationships that cumulatively define materials and information flows both downstream toward the customer and upstream toward the very first supplier.” Schroeder, R., Goldstein, S., and Rungtusanatham goes on to identify supply chain management as “the design and management of seamless, value-added processes across organizational boundaries to meet the real needs of the end customer.” Organizations have to prepare themselves to the best of their ability in order to provide or their customers. Customers expect to receive the upmost service, regardless of the type of organization they make contact with.

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.

Many companies produce products from parts of raw materials that are purchased from suppliers, till these products are reach the markets and presented for the customers, then you have the supply chain starting from the purchase of raw material from different areas , through the manufacturing steps and stages till is being sold by the consumer. Some of supply chains are well defined and easy to determined, while there are other supply chains complex to analyze. However, supply chains vary with the size of the facility such as; complexities, performance, abilities, flexibility, quality, speed, dependability and cost of preparing goods for manufacturing and the chain length distribution. So the supply chain is a network of wholesalers, retailers, distributors, workers in the transport, storage facilities, suppliers, and manufacturers who participate in the production, delivery and sale of the product to the last consumer. A supply chain is a group of facilities that coordinate activities among it and to avoid the competitors. Moreover, to ensure the supply chain management is operating efficiently and generating the highest level of customer

A supply chain is a series of integrated processes within and across a company that produce a product or service to meet the demands of a consumer (Krajewski, et. al., 2013). Every company has a specific supply chain design and this design is implemented to meet the company’s competitive priorities. Supply chain management refers to the coordination of the company’s processes with those of customers and suppliers to match the flow of services, materials, and information with customer demand. In today’s global market companies are choosing to outsource many of their processes in order to save time and money. While outsourcing and decentralizing many supply processes may seem to be more cost effective,

Based upon his ten years research on supply chain issues in diverse industries such as food, fashion, apparel and automobiles he devises a framework which will help

The concept of Supply Chain Management is based on two core ideas. The first is that practically every product that reaches an end user represents the cumulative effort of multiple organizations. These organizations are referred to collectively as the supply chain. Supply chain management, then, is the active management of supply chain activities to maximize customer value and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage. It represents a conscious effort by the supply chain firms to develop and run supply chains in the most effective & efficient ways possible. Supply chain activities cover everything from product development, sourcing, production, and logistics, as well as the information systems needed to coordinate these activities.

Over the years, the competition landscape for most companies has shifted from the highest-quality, lowest priced product or best performing product to the ability to respond to market needs quickly and get the right product at the right time to the right customer. This has in turn forced organizations to compete with their supply chain. Understanding supply chain management and putting this knowledge into practice has become a mandate to improve supply chain relationships in the entire world.

National and International businesses are becoming ever more dependent on logistics and supply chain management in order to keep pace with the demands of an increasingly global economy. This is why business leaders acknowledge that the supply chain can be a value creator and a source of competitive advantage.