It was not a natural disaster but terrorism (the September 9/11 attacks) that brought into question the transactional orthodoxy guiding the post-Cold War design configuration of international supply chains. The US government reaction was to put social pressure and introduce trade measures on multi-national enterprises (MNEs) that were importing manufactured products based on scale economies and low factor production costs. They were forced to self-police their supply chains and implement security measures. If they were be able to continue to have access to the US market. In order to reduce security risks they had to become involved in public/private partnerships, have CTPAT accreditation, build up buffer “stock” and offer financial support to domestic manufacturers and logistic firms. This was perceived as a cost of production rather than a source of future capability. However security poses only one source of disruption and it became evident that there were many natural as well as man-made disasters confronting international supply chains. Therefore, by 2005, the work of MIT’s Yossi Sheffi with his seminal book “The Resilient Enterprise” brought scholarly attention to the need for firms to have resilient supply chains. A chain robust enough to absorb disruption, keep functioning and return back to normal supply activity in as short a time as possible. In 2015, Sheffi re-emphasized the power of resilience in the supply chain through his latest book “The Power of Resilience: How the Best Companies Manage the Unexpected.” This perceived resilience as a capability for building supply chain competitive advantage. Whilst supply chain resilience has grown as an important scholarly field, one area overlooked by scholars is the role to be played by big data technology. In this technical viewpoint we explore the role that big data could play in the supply chain, to improve its resilience and transform its operational capability. It acknowledges the reasons for the dearth of scholarship and also looks at the “dark side” of big data as well as highlighting the contribution that such technology might play in a radical revision of the resilience discourse. Finally, we propose an initial theoretical framework with examples of the type of operational capabilities that big data could bring with respect to international supply chain resilience.
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)