Entry modes in reshoring strategies: An empirical analysis

The changing contours of global value chains post-COVID: Evidence from the Commonwealth

The COVID-19 pandemic emphasised the global value chains (GVCs) debate by focussing on whether gains from GVC participation outweigh firms associated risks of demand and supply shocks amid rising protectionism. This paper bridges the gap between the international trade and management literature by examining the impact of COVID-19 on Commonwealth countries, an area that has received scant attention in academic literature. Using the Eora database, we simulate scenarios to examine Commonwealth countries' participation in GVCs post-COVID. We draw on the transaction cost economics (TCE) theory to develop a framework that investigates whether growing protectionism, associated with reshoring, decoupling and nearshoring, could potentially affect the constellation and participation of Commonwealth countries in GVCs post-COVID. Results show that trade protectionism is likely to impact the supply chains and lead to GVC reconfiguration, which could offer opportunities for the Commonwealth countries and firms to potentially gain following the geographical redistribution of suppliers.

Setbacks, interruptions and turnarounds in the internationalization process: a bibliometric and literature review of de-internationalization

The paper presents a comprehensive review of research on de-internationalization, encompassing the themes of export withdrawal, subsidiary divestment, and backshoring or reshoring. A bibliometric technique (co-word analysis) on keywords from articles and book chapters published from 1980 to 2020 was initially used to confirm the main strands related to de-internationalization. Then, the study employed a bibliometric coupling analysis to identify the recent trends within each theme. The literature was divided into three clusters, which, using different but related terms, addressed the same phenomenon of firms’ decrease in foreign commitment. The ramifications of research on de-internationalization were examined for each of the clusters, mapping the issues deserving of further investigation and making recommendations for future research. The study uses an unprecedented method for understanding the de-internationalization phenomenon more broadly, delimiting its conceptual boundaries and mapping the different manifestations within a single theoretical domain.

Digital Innovation for the Sustainability of Reshoring Strategies: A Literature Review

Recently, some critical events (e.g., the economic decline, the growing socio-ecologic burden, even more demanding customers, etc.) have led several companies to re-think their “shoring” decisions. Therefore, many of them decided to reshore manufacturing or to bring back home production activities previously offshored. This phenomenon represents one of the current imperatives for research. In fact, the location where manufacturing takes place has a massive influence on the sustainability of firms on a local and global level. Therefore, to better understand what makes reshoring strategies sustainable as well as to identify the drivers that can boost it, further research is still needed. The explorative nature of this paper recognizes some motivations or drivers for making reshoring strategies sustainable. To this end, a structured and narrative literature review has been conducted to grasp and describe the main motivations and implementation characteristics that can make reshoring decisions sustainable. The achieved results better define reshoring and the influence that some drivers, especially digital innovation, can play on the related strategies and on their sustainability. In doing so, this work is one of the first contributions that jointly approaches reshoring, sustainability, and digital innovation.

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.

Doing the right thing or doing things right: what is better for a successful manufacturing reshoring?

The article concerns the revision of earlier decisions to offshore production activities (so called “relocation of second degree”); more specifically it is focused on the “reshoring” (also referred as “relocation to the home country”, “back-reshoring” or “back-shoring”). The research aims are to investigate what types of mistakes occur along the decision-making and implementation process and how they affect the outcome, in terms of success or failure, of a relocation strategy. A multiple case study involving four companies in the fashion industry from Portugal and Italy was conducted. The cross-case analysis allowed to differentiate decision-making mistakes from implementation ones and to assess differences and similarities among the cases in terms of content of the relocation, drivers and outcomes. The research contributes to previous literature on reshoring by bringing evidence of different types of mistakes to be considered, thus requiring further conceptualization of the reshoring process. Managers and entrepreneurs should consider the importance of doing the things right also during the implementation, too often underestimated. The present article is the first one in the reshoring literature bringing evidence of cases of failure in the relocation decisions and discriminating among different kinds of mistakes.

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.