A Model for the Understanding of Supply Chain Networks

This paper aims to develop a framework for the understanding of why and how supplier management influences the buying company’s strategy and performance. These are highly dependent on suppliers’ actions and on the way the relationships with them are managed by the buying company. Authors have developed extensive and valuable research on the impact of supplier relationships in a network context. However, important issues regarding supply management and its effects on the performance and strategy of the buying firm seem not to be fully investigated. In this context, this paper encompasses a model of supply chain networks developed on the basis of the conceptual framework of the IMP group. INTRODUCTION Over the past few years, liberalization and globalisation of production and trade caused the intensification of competition in most industries. Reacting to this process, firms try to develop and sustain a relevant market positioning through a growing specialization around their core resources and competencies (Hartmann et al. 2001), and acquire to other organizations goods and services not essential to those competencies (Cousins and Spekman 2000; Möller and Törrönen 2000). Simultaneously, both the importance of the value and content (Gadde and Håkansson 2001) of industrial purchasing is growing and leveraging purchasing and supply management to a strategic level (Gattorna and Walters 1996).