Nissan case study Essay

Hitchcock Automotive Services owns Puente Hills Toyota (PHT), which is a privately held company. In addition to, Hitchcock Automotive Services owning Puente Hills Toyota, they also own two other Toyota dealerships, a Volkswagen, Ford, Hyundai, and BMW dealership, all located in California. Puente Hills Toyota was a large Toyota dealership with about $85 million in annual sales. PHT employs around 145 employees and was awarded several excellent performance awards, including the Toyota’s President Award for overall excellence for the past 13 years (Merchant & Van der Stede, 2012). The dealership’s organizational structure was similar to those of others within the industry, other than they combined the new and used vehicle sales department. This organizational structure worked with Hitchcock Automotive Service’s philosophy of keeping manufacturers and customers happy. (Merchant & Van der Stede, 2012)

The Bargaining Power of Suppliers (Moderate): Most of the industry’s products are sourced and manufactured by a network of third parties. The supplier group is diluted compared to the industry; KMD alone has over 45 suppliers. There is credible threat of suppliers adopting forward integration resulting in loss of major suppliers and emergence of new competitors for the industry. Highly effective and specialised products will pose high supplier switching costs for industry firms.

Overview: The Toyota Production System has long been hailed and admired as the source of Toyota’s outstanding performance as a manufacturer. TPS aims to eliminate waste, reduce defects and maximize flow. TPS aims to increase efficiency and productivity by employing a unique production system that cuts costs through continuous improvement. Long term goal is to yield sharp reductions in product development and manufacturing lead times. Toyota want to be the industry best and they stand behind their culture to share the wealth of how they do it.

Costco’s competitive advantage is partnering with venders, yet it is highly safeguarded from public release. Very little is known about the process as to how Costco partners with vendors. The ability to have good relationships with vendors allows Costco to maintain their stagey by

Therefore the purchasing department will be able to reduce the cost to more efficient and effective process and it will be able to deliver better process.

To keep up with an effort to develop a seamless organization between suppliers and buyers; many boundaries that are in place

The reason of implementing supplier integration in the design and fabricating processes for Deere & John is to move towards a new business model to stay competitive in the increasing global competition.

The concept of supply chain is tightly linked to the concept of collaboration. A supply chain by nature involves the interaction of two or more firms, sharing resources, risks and capabilities and jointly working to achieve higher business performance. Therefore, companies involved in a supply chain structure must ensure collaboration among their partners by applying the following interventions :

Just like the other industries such as apparel, electronics, and consumer goods, the automobile industry has accelerated its foreign direct investment, cross border trade and global production. The automobile industry has increased outsourcing and bundled value chain activities in major supplier chains. As a result, more developed countries that serve as suppliers have increased their involvement in trade and FDI. With these increased supplier capabilities, large national suppliers have become global suppliers and are now controlling multinational operations. This is because of their increased capability of providing good and services to various lead firms all over the world. The automotive industry has a distinct firm structure. This

technology project. The BPTO produced weekly status reports and monthly budget reviews helping the company gauge where it was heading towards. Thus the alignment started advancing (Austin, 2007).

1) What benefits will Nissan gain if its procurement of parts is combined with Renault’s parts procurement on a global basis? Are there any costs to this change? What problems does Nissan create if it abandons the keiretsu system for purchasing parts? In what ways might the Internet facilitate this change?

One of the main reason behind this Japanese suppliers. Taking this into consideration SDT(Supplier Development teams) were developed .At first Nissan selected two engineers to undergo training activities in Japan. Based on this training, they have developed a 10 day improvement activity which started improving the suppliers by a major extent. They carry out evaluation of supplier activities at the supplier place and discuss necessary improvements and disclose the necessary action plan with senior management and take approval from them and carry on with improvement activity.

Continuous development and responsiveness of suppliers at the early age of product development process is critically important. “Honda tries to encourage suppliers’ suggestions early before finalizing drawings, particularly in the area of cost reduction and quality improvement.”

G. According to US News, the 2016 Toyota Prius was ranked #9 in compact cars, #5 in hybrid and electric cars, #8 in hatchbacks, and #10 in small cars (“2016 Toyota Prius | U.S. News & world report,” n.d.). It retails between $24,200 and $30,000 which is considered a compact car. “The Toyota Motor Corporation is a multinational corporation and now the world 's largest automaker in terms of sales, net worth, revenue, and profit according to Fortune Global 500. Toyota is positioned in the moderately low-price, high volume market” (“Strategic analysis of Toyota motor corporation,” 2003). They did move more into the higher-priced market with the Lexus brand and worked to fill the need for electric vehicles with the Toyota Prius. The company is diversified in various markets within the automobile industry and are able to branch out in several directions.

During March 1999, Brazilian Carlos Ghosn took over as the first non-Japanese Chief Operating Officer of Nissan, when Nissan had been incurring losses for seven of the prior eight years. Many of the industry analysts expected a culture clash between the French leadership style and his new Japanese employees. Analysts said, because the financial situation at Nissan had become critical so the decision to bring Ghosn in came at the worst possible time. The continuing losses were resulting in debts (approximately $22 billion) that were shaking the confidence of suppliers and financiers alike. Furthermore, the Nissan brand was weakening in the minds of consumers due to a product