Flexicurity and relocation of manufacturing

A hybrid fuzzy-AHP-TOPSIS model for evaluation of manufacturing relocation decisions

Manufacturing relocation decisions are complex because they involve combinations of location modes like offshoring or reshoring, and governance modes like insourcing or outsourcing. Furthermore, the uncertainty involved in the decision-making process makes it challenging to reach a right-shoring decision. This study presents a hybrid fuzzy-AHP-TOPSIS model to support generic relocation decisions. Industry experts were involved in a pairwise comparison of the competitive priorities’ decision criteria. A meta-synthesis of empirical studies is used to generate theoretical relocation scenarios. The presented hybrid model is used to rank the relocation scenarios in order to identify the most pertinent alternative. The resiliency of the solution is presented through a sensitivity analysis. The results indicate that the proposed hybrid model can simultaneously handle all the main relocation options involving governance modes. Based on the input data in this study, the competitive priorities criteria quality, time and cost are shown to have a strong impact, whereas the sustainability criterion has a weak impact on the choice of relocation option. The research presented in this paper contributes to the research field of manufacturing relocation by demonstrating the suitability of the hybrid fuzzy-AHP-TOPSIS model for relocation decisions and the resilience of the results. Furthermore, the research contributes to practice by providing managers with a generic relocation decision-support model that is capable of simultaneously handling and evaluating various relocation alternatives.

Thirteen years of Operations Management Research (OMR) journal: a bibliometric analysis and future research directions

The journal of Operations Management Research (OMR) is a rigorous journal that started its publication in 2008. It publishes short, focused research studies that advance both the theory and practice of operations management. Considering the relevant OMR’s contribution to the field of Operations Management in the last years, this study provides an overall assessment of the journal performance by conducting a retrospective review. To elaborate on OMR's temporal development in terms of publications, authors, affiliated institutions and countries, citation patterns, and conceptual structure, we extract publications from Scopus database for the period 2008–2020. We rely on bibliometric techniques in addition to bibliographic coupling, keyword analysis, and content analysis. 166 documents were analyzed using RStudio, VOSviewer, and Microsoft Excel. Findings emphasize OMR’s steady productivity growth (3.24%). Narrowly, Olhager J. is the most productive authors while Kalchschmidt M. and Stentoft J. are the most influential authors (H-index of 4). Furthermore, USA contributes to the highest number of publications while UK is the most influential country in terms of citations. Cranfield School of Management, UK stands as the top cited university. The analysis of the thematic evolution concludes to three main clusters: "Manufacturing and Supply chain Performance", "Six Sigma and Lean Management", and "Reshoring, Backshoring and Offshoring". This study recommends to further investigate the implications of the fourth industrial revolution and the sequels of COVID-19.

Challenges to competitive manufacturing in high-cost environments: checklist and insights from Swedish manufacturing firms

Research on competitive manufacturing (CM) in high-cost environments has earlier indicated that firms struggle to remain competitive and that manufacturing operations often have been offshored to low-cost environments. The purpose of this research is to explore and create a compounded view of challenges related to both internal and external environments of firms when operating in high-cost environments. This issue has been investigated through a qualitative case study involving five manufacturing firms in Sweden. This research has empirically derived the challenges associated with sustaining CM in high-cost environments and developed a prescriptive checklist. Seven main categories of challenges have been identified, ranging from a micro level related to product characteristics and employee involvement, to a macro level related to supply chain collaborations and industry systems. This research contributes to the existing literature on CM in high-cost locations by explaining and detailing what constitutes challenges in this kind of environment.

Back-shoring vs near-shoring: a comparative exploratory study in the footwear industry

After decades of off-shoring strategies, companies are often critically re-evaluating their earlier location decisions; in doing so, sometimes they implement the so-called relocation of second degree. Among them, back-shoring (i.e., relocation to the home country) and near-shoring (relocation to the home region) are two of the alternatives attracting growing interest from scholars. This paper aims to shed new light on the variables influencing the choice made between these two alternatives. As requested in the extant literature, a contingency approach is adopted, focusing attention on the footwear industry. Given the exploratory nature of the paper, evidence from 41 back-shoring and near-shoring strategies are analysed, comparing data from Spanish and Italian companies. Collected data are adapted to test hypotheses concerning three sets of variables: firms’ characteristics, motivations for the second degree relocation and its barriers. Collected data show that firm’s size directly influences the chosen alternative since larger companies prefer to near-shore instead of back-shore. When considering motivations, while the “made in” effect does not influence the firm’s choice, availability of skilled contractors and/or government aids induces companies to relocate to the home country instead of the home region. Finally, companies fearing encountering barriers, in terms of skilled contractors’ availability and/or (re-)development of internal manufacturing competences, will prefer the back-shoring rather than the near-shoring option. The study is focused on two countries (Spain and Italy) where the manufacturing sector (and the footwear industry within it) is still relevant to the local economy. Findings cannot be generalized to countries/industries where the local industry has been totally dismantled, without a previous in-depth analysis. The findings obtained offer managers useful insights on the elements that should be carefully evaluated when considering back- and near-shore alternatives. Additionally, valuable insights are provided for policy makers that plan to design industrial policies supporting back-reshoring policy initiatives. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper in the extant literature addressing variables influencing the choice between back- and near-shoring alternatives.

Destruction Decisions for Managing Excess Inventory in E-Commerce Logistics

The Internet has brought about new possibilities for innovation and radically changed business activities. Internet shopping is a prime example of increasing popularity, which is exacerbated due to the recent pandemic. It is expected that e-commerce will accommodate more than a quarter of the total retail sales worldwide in the next few years. Given the characteristics of e-commerce, inventory management is of paramount importance for an effective and timely response to the online customers’ demand. Despite its relevance, the issue of warehouse excess inventory is not sufficiently studied in the operations management literature. This study explores the factors, including sustainability and strategic considerations, that influence the inventory destruction decisions as one of the alternatives for managing excess inventory. Applying the Fuzzy Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL) method, the interrelationships between the decision factors are investigated and the decisive considerations are identified. Overall, the outcomes provide insights for the e-commerce practitioners and offer directions for modeling and managing inventory destruction decisions.