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The impact of manufacturing and supply chain improvement initiatives: an empirical comparative analysis of make-to-order and make-to-stock firms

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Author

Summary, in English

Manufacturing firms aim at improving both internal and external processes to improve the competitive advantage. Such initiatives include lean practices as well as supplier rationalization and integration. In this paper, we analyze these improvement initiatives and their impact on business performance. In particular, we explore potential differences between make-to-order (MTO) and make-to-stock (MTS) firms. We use data from 216 Australian manufacturing firms. We find a clear difference of improvement focus between MTO and MTS firms. MTO firms exhibit a significant impact of supplier integration on business performance, but not for lean practices and supplier rationalization. The situation is completely reversed for MTS firms, since they have significant effects for internal lean practices and supplier rationalization, but not for logistics integration with supplier. The results show that the distinction between MTO and MTS firms is important when analyzing manufacturing and supply chain improvement initiatives.

Publishing year

2012

Language

English

Pages

159-165

Publication/Series

Omega: the International Journal of Management Science

Volume

40

Issue

2

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Elsevier

Topic

  • Transport Systems and Logistics

Keywords

  • Survey research
  • decoupling point
  • lean practices
  • logistics integration
  • supplier relationships
  • business performance.

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 0305-0483