Reference: DPI2012-38061-C02-01
Period underway: 01/01/2013 – 01/01/2016
Type: Competitive research projects
Amount: 47,970 €
Financed by: SPANISH MINISTRY OF ECONOMY AND COMPETITIVENESS
Principal Investigator: Mula Bru, Josefa
Participants: Poler R.; Tormo Carbó, Guillermina; Peidro Payá, David; Mula, Josefa; Ferriols Martínez, Francisco José; Díaz-Madroñero Boluda, Francisco Manuel; Olmeda Carrasco, Jesús

Description:

The need to develop international markets with more diverse and sophisticated customer requirements, and putting into practice comprehensive purchasing strategies to take advantage of market provider features, have meant having to set up and manage productive networks and more complex logistics. The fragmentation of production processes and the multi-location of activities have become increasingly relevant. This means that the agents which make up the global supply chain (e.g. distributors, manufacturers, suppliers, logistic operators, etc.) should develop new strategies of operations and supply beyond national boundaries to achieve optimal levels of quality, flexibility and costs. The internationalisation process is one of the most difficult decisions to make as it involves many risks, mainly for SMEs which have limited resources. This research project focuses on the specific stage which involves shaping a model with production multi-locations and/or with new productive deployments, the impact on designing a productive system and logistics, and on designing the network of associated suppliers. This research project offers a methodological and technical solution for those companies whose internationalisation process commenced in the last few years («late movers») and especially addresses SMEs, the indisputable driver of Spanish economy. The general objectives of the research project are to: a) generate a methodology and the techniques associated with analysing and designing global supply chains with production multi-locations, and designing production plants, warehouses and supplier networks in international contexts that involve economic, social and environmental factors that need to be contemplated. These factors, and the fact that they are not included in the design, cause delays in implementations, higher costs, and even redesigning failures; b) develop conceptual models with associated work methods, simulation and optimisation tools to help make critical decisions and to implement guidelines to facilitate the design and management of operations in global supply chains; c) provide empirical research of the proposed models and tools. For these challenging objectives, the research plan proposes a multidisciplinary team and coordinates two research groups (TECNUN, UPV) that use the best academic contributions and practices in an exploration stage to validate the proposal in a confirmation stage with empirical studies in order to subsequently disseminate and transfer generated knowledge. Finally, in order to validate the results, this project will be coordinated by the support of ten industrial EPO enterprises.