Query optimization, which aims to reduce query evaluation time, is crucial to the success of XML ... more Query optimization, which aims to reduce query evaluation time, is crucial to the success of XML database systems because of the complex structure of XML data and XML queries. Existing optimization techniques neither take the advantage of the rich semantic knowledge available in XML databases nor utilize it in a systematic and efficient manner, resulting in significant reduction of optimization opportunities. Aiming to address these deficiencies, an XML Semantic Query Optimization framework, which employs XML Declarative Description (XDD) theory to model XML databases, XML semantic queries as well as semantic knowledge, is proposed and developed. It uses Equivalent Transformation framework as a basis for query optimization at the semantic (logical) level. The framework fully utilizes, in a systematic way, available semantic knowledge in a database and its schema, and allows flexible but precise control of query optimization processes. Semantic knowledge, formulated as XML Integrity ...
The purpose of this study is to identify critical factors for successful Six-Sigma implementation... more The purpose of this study is to identify critical factors for successful Six-Sigma implementation by using the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) approach. Twenty-one experts, consisting of three-project champions and eighteen-black belts from five multinational companies (Singapore, Japan, and USA) locating in Thailand, were interviewed. The study has gone through four phases, including: (1) determining critical factors and performance measures in Six-Sigma implementation; (2) structuring the problem and building the AHP model; (3) collecting data from expert interviews; and (4) determining the normalized priority weights of individual factors and sub-factors. Expert Choice software was used to compute the normalized and unique priority weights. The result of data analysis determined the relative importance of individual factors and sub-factors, and in turn identified the critical factors on which organizations should put their efforts throughout the process of 6-Sigma implementation.
International Journal of Production Economics, 2015
ABSTRACT Over the past three decades original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) located in China and... more ABSTRACT Over the past three decades original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) located in China and elsewhere have been aggressively sourcing from Chinese suppliers. This has significantly contributed toward the complexity of global supply chains. Generally, both tangible and intangible factors contribute to the complexity, with intangible factors being relatively more dominant compared with the tangible factors. Through an extensive literature review we identify several intangible factors associated with people, culture, and infrastructure; as well as policies and regulations on sourcing complexity. We investigate the impact of these factors and elements on sourcing complexity, using a sample of 101 OEMs based in China. Using importance-complexity matrix analysis we identify lack of knowledge, quality issues, price erosion, increases in comparative price levels, supply risk and demand volatility as critical intangible elements. We suggest appropriate supplier contractual strategies such as collaborative relationships as we predict that contractual relationships that benefit by trust, shared knowledge, skill development and direct purchase from suppliers or through international procurement offices would suppress or greatly diminish most of the intangible sourcing complexity elements.
ABSTRACT The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of supply chain complexity and sug... more ABSTRACT The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of supply chain complexity and suggests appropriate supply chain strategies based on material flow and contractual relationships, to align product and process complexities. The material flow strategies considered for product and process alignment are lean, agile, leagile and risk hedging. The strategies considered for the contractual relationship are types of relationship, integration and preferred channel of operation. We substantiate the link between strategies and types of complexities using a case study. The discussion of this chapter is useful to supply chain managers for leveraging product and process complexities into competitive advantage.
International Journal of Production Economics, 2012
E-waste (discarded computers and electronic goods) has become a major environmental issue. It can... more E-waste (discarded computers and electronic goods) has become a major environmental issue. It can be minimized by increasing recovery from the waste stream through reverse supply chains. This paper proposes a framework for end-of-life (EOL) computer recycling operations. It identifies critical factors for implementing EOL computer recycling operations and investigates the causal relationship among the factors influencing computer recycling operations in reverse supply chains using the cognition mapping process DEMATEL. Results indicate availability of resource, coordination and integration of recycling tasks and the volume and quality of recyclable materials, are critical for computer recycling operations. Factors such as government legislation, incentive and customer demand are found to be the major drivers.
Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, 2010
PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which lean management practices are ... more PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which lean management practices are adopted by manufacturing organizations in Thailand and their impact on firms' operational performance.Design/methodology/approachUsing a survey questionnaire, data were collected against 13 lean practices from 187 middle and senior managers belonging to 187 Thai manufacturing firms. Using factor analysis these lean practices were then clustered into three higher level constructs namely just in time (JIT), waste minimization and flow management. The responding firms were categorized into small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and large enterprises (LEs) based on size and Thai‐owned, foreign‐owned and joint venture firms based on ownership. The multiple regression models were employed to investigate the effects of three lean constructs on operational performance in different categories of firms. The operational performance is measured by four parameters such as quick delivery compared to ...
Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, 2015
This editorial piece discusses the current trends and future research directions in green supply ... more This editorial piece discusses the current trends and future research directions in green supply chain collaboration and incentives. The discussion begins with evolution of green supply chain collaborations and few contributions made so far. The editorial piece introduces the special issue papers which address the green collaboration challenges and offers a general framework suggesting pathways for future research. The article ends with the open research questions in green supply chain collaborations and incentives.
International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management, 2006
Six-Sigma is a well-established and one of the most recognized approaches in manufacturing strate... more Six-Sigma is a well-established and one of the most recognized approaches in manufacturing strategy development. Companies who have adopted and successfully implemented such a methodology were found to be more innovative which led to increased customer satisfaction and an improved bottom line. The aim of this study is to identify factors for successful Six-Sigma implementation by using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). The study involves four phases, which include: (1) assessment of potential factors and performance measures in Six-Sigma implementation (2) development of the problem structure and building the AHP model (3) soliciting and compilation of opinion on preferences through expert interviews, and (4) determination of critical success factors. Twenty-one experts, consisting of three-project champions and eighteen-black belts from five multinational companies located in Thailand, were interviewed. Expert Choice® software was used to compute the normalized and unique prior...
International Journal of Production Economics, 2012
Textile supply chains consist of multinational garment retailers (customers), garment manufacture... more Textile supply chains consist of multinational garment retailers (customers), garment manufacturers (suppliers), and ancillary suppliers (suppliers to manufacturers). This paper evaluates suppliers' within the Indian textile and clothing industry (both garment manufacturers and ancillary suppliers) using sustainability criteria. Examining a sample of sixty-three suppliers and six sustainability criteria (i.e. discrimination, abuse of human right, child labor, long working hours, unfair competition, and pollution), we categorize suppliers into the three categories of 'good performer', moderate performer', and 'performance not up to expectation'. Since all the criteria are potentially subjective, we have employed the grey approach for analysis. The results indicate that the criterion of long working hours is a critical one for both categories of suppliers; in the case of garment manufacturers, we found that pollution and unfair competition were the most important criteria. In addition, employing child labor was found to be a critical criterion in the case of ancillary suppliers.
This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian ret... more This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian retail firms. Through the critical case sampling method we identify 17 major retail firms and analyse contents of their returns policies in terms of returns services. We develop a generic returns operations process model that can be follow ed by retailers. Analysis of return policies indicates quick resolution of return claims, less customer effort, and clarity of return policy and process are critical determinants for customer service elements of returns management in retails. The findings of the study can act as a reference guide to senior executives developing strategies for competitive advantage through efficient product returns management viz. customer retention and asset management. --ANZAM conference held: 4-6 December, Hobart, Tasmania
Fast-changing consumer demand and preference in the fashion-oriented sporting goods industry inte... more Fast-changing consumer demand and preference in the fashion-oriented sporting goods industry intensify the retailer's perceived uncertainty in purchase decisions. To minimize retailers' decision-making uncertainty (DMU) , enhancing the cooperative relationships between the retailers and suppliers in such markets are of paramount importance to the supply chain performance. The aim of this study is to investigate how retailer-supplier cooperation and DMU affect the supply chain performance and how the relationship dimensions are related to cooperation and DMU. The results indicate that retailer-supplier cooperation and retai,ler's DMU had significant impact on supply chain performance in terms of financial and non-financial performance measures.
This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian ret... more This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian retail firms. Through the critical case sampling method we identify 17 major retail firms and analyse contents of their returns policies in terms of returns services. We develop a generic returns operations process model that can be followed by retailers. Analysis of return policies indicates quick resolution of return claims, less customer effort, and clarity of return policy and process are critical determinants for customer service elements of returns management in retails. The findings of the study can act as a reference guide to senior executives developing strategies for competitive advantage through efficient product returns management viz. customer retention and asset management.
In this paper, a recovery model is developed for managing sudden supply delays that affect retail... more In this paper, a recovery model is developed for managing sudden supply delays that affect retailers’ Economic Order Quantity (EOQ) model. For this, a mathematical model is developed that considers demand uncertainty and safety stock, and generates a recovery plan for a finite future period immediately after a sudden supply delay. Solving recovery problems involve high commercial software costs, and their solutions are complex. Therefore, an efficient heuristic solution is developed that generates the recovery plan after a sudden supply delay. An experiment is conducted to test the proposed approach. To assess the quality and consistency of solutions, the performance of the proposed heuristic is compared with the performance of the Generalized Reduced Gradient (GRG) method, which is widely applied in constrained mathematical programming. Several numerical examples are presented and a sensitivity analysis is performed to demonstrate the effects of various parameters on the performanc...
Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has emerged as one of the most significant proce... more Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has emerged as one of the most significant process innovations in supply chain contexts. It is a proven technology with the capability to increase accuracy, efficiency and speed of supply chain processes; reduce inventory and handling costs. The aim of this study is to investigate and compare enabling factors of RFID implementation in Australian and Chinese supply chains. Employing the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) approach this study suggests that managers in Chinese firms have a very different view concerning importance of factors for RFID implementation. Australians firms view technological factor-category as the most important priority, whereas Chinese firms view it as the least important category. Again, Australian firms view organizational factor-category as one of the least important priorities in terms of RFID implementation, whereas Chinese view it by far the most important. With respect to external environment category, t...
Social Media (SM), in recent years, is emerging as a common platform for low cost information exc... more Social Media (SM), in recent years, is emerging as a common platform for low cost information exchange, and has attracted a critical mass of users both at corporate and retail levels. Theoretically, SM can thus be used as a tool to strengthen e-procurement in the public sector. Towards this end, we have prepared a conceptual model drawing on literature reviews and some examples while identifying a set of expected benefits and challenges within four stages of e-procurement. Using the framework, a case study has been conducted involving Australian public procurement initiatives and 15 federal government senior officials engaged in e-procurement. They have been interviewed to shed light on the possibilities and challenges of using SM in the public e-procurement context. The findings of the study suggest a limited scope for SM usage in the Australian public sector eprocurement process. The implications of the findings are discussed and some recommendations offered.
PurposeThis paper aims to examine critical factors of successful logistics outsourcing relationsh... more PurposeThis paper aims to examine critical factors of successful logistics outsourcing relationship from the perspectives of both LSPs and shippers employing case studies in Singapore and Vietnam as examples of well-established and growing logistics outsourcing markets.Design/methodology/approachThe case study design is adopted to empirically examine logistics outsourcing practices. Data were collected through in-depth interviews with senior managers from four cases in Singapore and seven cases in Vietnam. These case organisations are engaged comprehensively in logistics outsourcing activities and encompass both international firms that have their local operations and those local firms whose operations expand internationally.FindingsResults suggest that the success of logistics outsourcing may depend on five strategic factors and five operational factors, with some of them being the same between LSPs and shippers in both countries and in line with the literature. There also seemed t...
In the context of a dynamic and hypercompetitive business environment, effective supply chain des... more In the context of a dynamic and hypercompetitive business environment, effective supply chain design helps organisations to align resources for improved flow of products and services and satisfy customers’ diverse needs. Scholars have proposed several mutually exclusive supply chain designs such as efficient versus responsive, and lean versus agile. Quantitative testing has revealed that supply chain designs of many firms do not match with what was conceptually expected. To address this mismatch, in this study, a new approach to supply chain leagility is introduced and the impact of uncertainty as the key design driver of supply chains on leagility is investigated. The partial least squares (PLS) was employed to analyse data collected from 299 Australian firms by administering a structured questionnaire. Results indicate that higher performance is achievable on minimising the deviation from a balanced supply chain in which aspects of both leanness and agility are equally embedded. Further, the level of uncertainty directly and positively affects the Deviation from Leagility (DFL) index.
Supply chains in East Asia are being redesigned following the reassessment of the risk of disrupt... more Supply chains in East Asia are being redesigned following the reassessment of the risk of disruption through terrorist attacks. The nature of these risks and of the costs of the private sector responses is reviewed. The research available suggests the costs incurred are substantial. Government regulation applied to security matters also applies within supply chains. It too has been redesigned in response to the change in the risk of terrorist attacks. Examples of its impacts, and its costs and benefits, are presented. Relevant empirical work remains scarce, but principles for government's role can be identified.
Query optimization, which aims to reduce query evaluation time, is crucial to the success of XML ... more Query optimization, which aims to reduce query evaluation time, is crucial to the success of XML database systems because of the complex structure of XML data and XML queries. Existing optimization techniques neither take the advantage of the rich semantic knowledge available in XML databases nor utilize it in a systematic and efficient manner, resulting in significant reduction of optimization opportunities. Aiming to address these deficiencies, an XML Semantic Query Optimization framework, which employs XML Declarative Description (XDD) theory to model XML databases, XML semantic queries as well as semantic knowledge, is proposed and developed. It uses Equivalent Transformation framework as a basis for query optimization at the semantic (logical) level. The framework fully utilizes, in a systematic way, available semantic knowledge in a database and its schema, and allows flexible but precise control of query optimization processes. Semantic knowledge, formulated as XML Integrity ...
The purpose of this study is to identify critical factors for successful Six-Sigma implementation... more The purpose of this study is to identify critical factors for successful Six-Sigma implementation by using the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) approach. Twenty-one experts, consisting of three-project champions and eighteen-black belts from five multinational companies (Singapore, Japan, and USA) locating in Thailand, were interviewed. The study has gone through four phases, including: (1) determining critical factors and performance measures in Six-Sigma implementation; (2) structuring the problem and building the AHP model; (3) collecting data from expert interviews; and (4) determining the normalized priority weights of individual factors and sub-factors. Expert Choice software was used to compute the normalized and unique priority weights. The result of data analysis determined the relative importance of individual factors and sub-factors, and in turn identified the critical factors on which organizations should put their efforts throughout the process of 6-Sigma implementation.
International Journal of Production Economics, 2015
ABSTRACT Over the past three decades original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) located in China and... more ABSTRACT Over the past three decades original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) located in China and elsewhere have been aggressively sourcing from Chinese suppliers. This has significantly contributed toward the complexity of global supply chains. Generally, both tangible and intangible factors contribute to the complexity, with intangible factors being relatively more dominant compared with the tangible factors. Through an extensive literature review we identify several intangible factors associated with people, culture, and infrastructure; as well as policies and regulations on sourcing complexity. We investigate the impact of these factors and elements on sourcing complexity, using a sample of 101 OEMs based in China. Using importance-complexity matrix analysis we identify lack of knowledge, quality issues, price erosion, increases in comparative price levels, supply risk and demand volatility as critical intangible elements. We suggest appropriate supplier contractual strategies such as collaborative relationships as we predict that contractual relationships that benefit by trust, shared knowledge, skill development and direct purchase from suppliers or through international procurement offices would suppress or greatly diminish most of the intangible sourcing complexity elements.
ABSTRACT The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of supply chain complexity and sug... more ABSTRACT The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of supply chain complexity and suggests appropriate supply chain strategies based on material flow and contractual relationships, to align product and process complexities. The material flow strategies considered for product and process alignment are lean, agile, leagile and risk hedging. The strategies considered for the contractual relationship are types of relationship, integration and preferred channel of operation. We substantiate the link between strategies and types of complexities using a case study. The discussion of this chapter is useful to supply chain managers for leveraging product and process complexities into competitive advantage.
International Journal of Production Economics, 2012
E-waste (discarded computers and electronic goods) has become a major environmental issue. It can... more E-waste (discarded computers and electronic goods) has become a major environmental issue. It can be minimized by increasing recovery from the waste stream through reverse supply chains. This paper proposes a framework for end-of-life (EOL) computer recycling operations. It identifies critical factors for implementing EOL computer recycling operations and investigates the causal relationship among the factors influencing computer recycling operations in reverse supply chains using the cognition mapping process DEMATEL. Results indicate availability of resource, coordination and integration of recycling tasks and the volume and quality of recyclable materials, are critical for computer recycling operations. Factors such as government legislation, incentive and customer demand are found to be the major drivers.
Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, 2010
PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which lean management practices are ... more PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which lean management practices are adopted by manufacturing organizations in Thailand and their impact on firms' operational performance.Design/methodology/approachUsing a survey questionnaire, data were collected against 13 lean practices from 187 middle and senior managers belonging to 187 Thai manufacturing firms. Using factor analysis these lean practices were then clustered into three higher level constructs namely just in time (JIT), waste minimization and flow management. The responding firms were categorized into small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and large enterprises (LEs) based on size and Thai‐owned, foreign‐owned and joint venture firms based on ownership. The multiple regression models were employed to investigate the effects of three lean constructs on operational performance in different categories of firms. The operational performance is measured by four parameters such as quick delivery compared to ...
Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, 2015
This editorial piece discusses the current trends and future research directions in green supply ... more This editorial piece discusses the current trends and future research directions in green supply chain collaboration and incentives. The discussion begins with evolution of green supply chain collaborations and few contributions made so far. The editorial piece introduces the special issue papers which address the green collaboration challenges and offers a general framework suggesting pathways for future research. The article ends with the open research questions in green supply chain collaborations and incentives.
International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management, 2006
Six-Sigma is a well-established and one of the most recognized approaches in manufacturing strate... more Six-Sigma is a well-established and one of the most recognized approaches in manufacturing strategy development. Companies who have adopted and successfully implemented such a methodology were found to be more innovative which led to increased customer satisfaction and an improved bottom line. The aim of this study is to identify factors for successful Six-Sigma implementation by using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). The study involves four phases, which include: (1) assessment of potential factors and performance measures in Six-Sigma implementation (2) development of the problem structure and building the AHP model (3) soliciting and compilation of opinion on preferences through expert interviews, and (4) determination of critical success factors. Twenty-one experts, consisting of three-project champions and eighteen-black belts from five multinational companies located in Thailand, were interviewed. Expert Choice® software was used to compute the normalized and unique prior...
International Journal of Production Economics, 2012
Textile supply chains consist of multinational garment retailers (customers), garment manufacture... more Textile supply chains consist of multinational garment retailers (customers), garment manufacturers (suppliers), and ancillary suppliers (suppliers to manufacturers). This paper evaluates suppliers' within the Indian textile and clothing industry (both garment manufacturers and ancillary suppliers) using sustainability criteria. Examining a sample of sixty-three suppliers and six sustainability criteria (i.e. discrimination, abuse of human right, child labor, long working hours, unfair competition, and pollution), we categorize suppliers into the three categories of 'good performer', moderate performer', and 'performance not up to expectation'. Since all the criteria are potentially subjective, we have employed the grey approach for analysis. The results indicate that the criterion of long working hours is a critical one for both categories of suppliers; in the case of garment manufacturers, we found that pollution and unfair competition were the most important criteria. In addition, employing child labor was found to be a critical criterion in the case of ancillary suppliers.
This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian ret... more This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian retail firms. Through the critical case sampling method we identify 17 major retail firms and analyse contents of their returns policies in terms of returns services. We develop a generic returns operations process model that can be follow ed by retailers. Analysis of return policies indicates quick resolution of return claims, less customer effort, and clarity of return policy and process are critical determinants for customer service elements of returns management in retails. The findings of the study can act as a reference guide to senior executives developing strategies for competitive advantage through efficient product returns management viz. customer retention and asset management. --ANZAM conference held: 4-6 December, Hobart, Tasmania
Fast-changing consumer demand and preference in the fashion-oriented sporting goods industry inte... more Fast-changing consumer demand and preference in the fashion-oriented sporting goods industry intensify the retailer's perceived uncertainty in purchase decisions. To minimize retailers' decision-making uncertainty (DMU) , enhancing the cooperative relationships between the retailers and suppliers in such markets are of paramount importance to the supply chain performance. The aim of this study is to investigate how retailer-supplier cooperation and DMU affect the supply chain performance and how the relationship dimensions are related to cooperation and DMU. The results indicate that retailer-supplier cooperation and retai,ler's DMU had significant impact on supply chain performance in terms of financial and non-financial performance measures.
This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian ret... more This study investigates the critical determinants of product returns management in Australian retail firms. Through the critical case sampling method we identify 17 major retail firms and analyse contents of their returns policies in terms of returns services. We develop a generic returns operations process model that can be followed by retailers. Analysis of return policies indicates quick resolution of return claims, less customer effort, and clarity of return policy and process are critical determinants for customer service elements of returns management in retails. The findings of the study can act as a reference guide to senior executives developing strategies for competitive advantage through efficient product returns management viz. customer retention and asset management.
In this paper, a recovery model is developed for managing sudden supply delays that affect retail... more In this paper, a recovery model is developed for managing sudden supply delays that affect retailers’ Economic Order Quantity (EOQ) model. For this, a mathematical model is developed that considers demand uncertainty and safety stock, and generates a recovery plan for a finite future period immediately after a sudden supply delay. Solving recovery problems involve high commercial software costs, and their solutions are complex. Therefore, an efficient heuristic solution is developed that generates the recovery plan after a sudden supply delay. An experiment is conducted to test the proposed approach. To assess the quality and consistency of solutions, the performance of the proposed heuristic is compared with the performance of the Generalized Reduced Gradient (GRG) method, which is widely applied in constrained mathematical programming. Several numerical examples are presented and a sensitivity analysis is performed to demonstrate the effects of various parameters on the performanc...
Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has emerged as one of the most significant proce... more Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has emerged as one of the most significant process innovations in supply chain contexts. It is a proven technology with the capability to increase accuracy, efficiency and speed of supply chain processes; reduce inventory and handling costs. The aim of this study is to investigate and compare enabling factors of RFID implementation in Australian and Chinese supply chains. Employing the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) approach this study suggests that managers in Chinese firms have a very different view concerning importance of factors for RFID implementation. Australians firms view technological factor-category as the most important priority, whereas Chinese firms view it as the least important category. Again, Australian firms view organizational factor-category as one of the least important priorities in terms of RFID implementation, whereas Chinese view it by far the most important. With respect to external environment category, t...
Social Media (SM), in recent years, is emerging as a common platform for low cost information exc... more Social Media (SM), in recent years, is emerging as a common platform for low cost information exchange, and has attracted a critical mass of users both at corporate and retail levels. Theoretically, SM can thus be used as a tool to strengthen e-procurement in the public sector. Towards this end, we have prepared a conceptual model drawing on literature reviews and some examples while identifying a set of expected benefits and challenges within four stages of e-procurement. Using the framework, a case study has been conducted involving Australian public procurement initiatives and 15 federal government senior officials engaged in e-procurement. They have been interviewed to shed light on the possibilities and challenges of using SM in the public e-procurement context. The findings of the study suggest a limited scope for SM usage in the Australian public sector eprocurement process. The implications of the findings are discussed and some recommendations offered.
PurposeThis paper aims to examine critical factors of successful logistics outsourcing relationsh... more PurposeThis paper aims to examine critical factors of successful logistics outsourcing relationship from the perspectives of both LSPs and shippers employing case studies in Singapore and Vietnam as examples of well-established and growing logistics outsourcing markets.Design/methodology/approachThe case study design is adopted to empirically examine logistics outsourcing practices. Data were collected through in-depth interviews with senior managers from four cases in Singapore and seven cases in Vietnam. These case organisations are engaged comprehensively in logistics outsourcing activities and encompass both international firms that have their local operations and those local firms whose operations expand internationally.FindingsResults suggest that the success of logistics outsourcing may depend on five strategic factors and five operational factors, with some of them being the same between LSPs and shippers in both countries and in line with the literature. There also seemed t...
In the context of a dynamic and hypercompetitive business environment, effective supply chain des... more In the context of a dynamic and hypercompetitive business environment, effective supply chain design helps organisations to align resources for improved flow of products and services and satisfy customers’ diverse needs. Scholars have proposed several mutually exclusive supply chain designs such as efficient versus responsive, and lean versus agile. Quantitative testing has revealed that supply chain designs of many firms do not match with what was conceptually expected. To address this mismatch, in this study, a new approach to supply chain leagility is introduced and the impact of uncertainty as the key design driver of supply chains on leagility is investigated. The partial least squares (PLS) was employed to analyse data collected from 299 Australian firms by administering a structured questionnaire. Results indicate that higher performance is achievable on minimising the deviation from a balanced supply chain in which aspects of both leanness and agility are equally embedded. Further, the level of uncertainty directly and positively affects the Deviation from Leagility (DFL) index.
Supply chains in East Asia are being redesigned following the reassessment of the risk of disrupt... more Supply chains in East Asia are being redesigned following the reassessment of the risk of disruption through terrorist attacks. The nature of these risks and of the costs of the private sector responses is reviewed. The research available suggests the costs incurred are substantial. Government regulation applied to security matters also applies within supply chains. It too has been redesigned in response to the change in the risk of terrorist attacks. Examples of its impacts, and its costs and benefits, are presented. Relevant empirical work remains scarce, but principles for government's role can be identified.
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Papers by Shams Rahman