The co-production of industrial services offers enormous potential, especially for German medium-sized companies. However, up to now there is a lack of a common language that guarantees efficient and secure work-cooperation of different companies at network level. The SealedServices research project is therefore developing a cooperative value creation network with which Internet-based services can be realized independently by SMEs. © 2021 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston, Germany.

The trend of digitalization has led to disruptive changes in production and supply chain planning, where autonomous machines and artificial intelligence gain competitive advantages. Besides, the satisfaction of customers’ wishes has reached top priority for demand-driven companies. Consequently, companies implement digital applications, for instance neural networks for accurate demand forecasting and optimized decision-making tools, to cope with nervous operational planning activities. Since planning tasks require human-machine interaction to increase performance and efficiency of planning decisions, this analysis focuses on forms of interaction to determine the right level of collaboration. The paper outlines various levels of interaction and analyses the impact of human reactions in the context of an industrial demand planning algorithm use case at Infineon Technologies AG conducting a behavioral experiment. The results show that a variance in the levels of human-machine interaction has influence on human acceptance of algorithms, but further experiments need to be conducted to outline an overall framework. © 2020, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is transforming how industries operate. It impacts on firms’ supply networks, business processes and business models. This article describes how the IoT influences the Purchasing and Supply Management (PSM) function. Our findings based on interviews and workshop with more than 200 senior European purchasing managers from large corporations suggest that PSM has opportunities to support the development of IoT solutions within firms which are required to work with dynamic and complex markets. At the same time, the IoT supports the development of a more capable and efficient PSM organisation. As part of this early stage theory building effort, we outline scenarios for the future of the PSM function. This leads us to reflect on how PSM leaders manage IoT-related tensions by means of differentiation and integration tactics. © 2019 Elsevier Ltd

The progress of digitalization enables new potentials to supply chain management by available data as well as by analysis methods like machine learning. This paper focuses on the master production planning matching demand and supply for a midterm time horizon, in a volatile, diverse and capacity constrained environment. Therefore, a framework for measuring instability is outlined, a machine learning approach to predict instability is developed and applied using the CRISP-DM methodology on real data of a semiconductor manufacturer. The evaluation and results foster the concept and the field of application, but request the next step of prescriptive instability minimization. © 2019, IFAC (International Federation of Automatic Control) Hosting by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Autonomous control methods (ACMs) are considered as a promising approach to deal with an increasingly dynamic and complex production environment. However, existing ACMs do not sufficiently utilize the potential arising out of the plannability offered by condition based maintenance orders in the context of predictive maintenance when doing dynamic and myopic production scheduling. In order to better leverage the potentials of a combined approach, this work presents a negotiation environment based on a reversed contract net protocol to enable a monetary comparability of both order types. This is intended to realize a better integration of condition based maintenance orders into the reactive machine allocation decision-making of ACMs. © 2019 Logistics Journal: Proceedings.

Discrete event simulation is becoming increasingly important in the planning and operation of complex manufacturing systems. A major problem with today's approach to manufacturing simulation studies is the collection and processing of data from heterogeneous sources, because the data is often of poor quality and does not contain all the necessary information for a simulation. This work introduces a framework that uses a real-time indoor localization systems (RTILS) as a central main data harmonizer, that is designed to feed production data into a manufacturing simulation from a single source of truth. It is shown, based on different data quality dimensions, how this contributes to a better overall data quality in manufacturing simulation. Furthermore, a detailed overview on which simulation inputs can be derived from the RTILS data is given. © 2019 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

The development of industrial product service systems (IPSS) and the associated increased value proposition through individual service bundles is becoming highly relevant for manufacturing companies. However, the transformation from product- to solution-oriented business models - called Servitization - faces a number of challenges, especially for medium-sized enterprises (SME) in manufacturing sector, which are positioned differently from large companies due to lower financial and personnel resources as well as organizational differences. The literature is increasingly focusing on Servitization, but special requirements for SMEs are not sufficiently considered. Practically relevant approaches are rarely encountered. For this purpose, a literature review was conducted to uncover barriers in Servitization. Using identified barriers and considering SME-specific strengths, a first proposal based on the Dortmund Management Model (DMM) is explained. The result is an aggregated description of barriers addressing relevant scientific fields (e.g. strategies, digitalization, development) to reveal further research needs. © 2019, IFAC (International Federation of Automatic Control) Hosting by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

It is widely agreed that supply chains encompass and integrate material, information, and financial flows across organizations. There is a robust history and continually expanding research agenda investigating supply chain management practice and theory associated with material and information flows and processes. However, the management of financial flows from a supply chain perspective and in combination with the other flows, usually referred to as supply chain finance (SCF), has been under-investigated. Our understanding of SCF approaches and solutions in purchasing and supply management (PSM) is only starting to form. The purpose of this editorial is to provide some grounding of initial studies and concepts of SCF, illustrate new and emerging thought in this discourse with articles published in this special issue, and speculate how the SCF domain may evolve in theory and practice with the advent of new digital technologies and big data analytics. © 2019 Elsevier Ltd

Increasing competition, stronger customer focus, shorter product lifecycles and accelerated technological developments imply that companies are faced with the challenge of adapting their own production to the circumstances at ever shorter intervals. The factory planning project is becoming increasingly complex, but there is less and less time available for adaptation. Particularly in the initial planning phase, targets are defined without reliable planning information for the further course, which have far-reaching consequences for the outcome of a successful planning. This paper shows a possibility to generate meaningful solution alternatives at an early stage of the target planning in order to enable an efficient planning process in terms of time and costs. With the help of a constraint-based variant compilation on the basis of previously defined target and frame parameters as well as existing information on the current factory system, various possible solution variants for target planning are to be created. A specific use case scenario was used to develop and test the presented methodology. By comparing combinations of the most diverse possible solutions, the use of a combinatory logic approach enables the first rough and plausible solution variants to be generated automatically, on the basis of which the detailed planning process for achieving the determined solution variant can be created. This way, planning bottlenecks due to the wrong choice of variants as well as large time expenditure for the creation of solution variants can be avoided. © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2018.

Autonomous control methods (ACMs) are a promising approach to cope with the increasing complexity and dynamics of the business environment. In this context, sequencing flexibility provides great potential to increase the logistic performance of these methods. To optimally utilize this potential in production management, a quantification is required. However, the existing approaches to quantify sequencing flexibility are not suitable for the use in ACMs. Therefore, this article introduces a key figure to map sequencing flexibility based on precedence graphs for use in ACMs. For this purpose, requirements for the key figure are derived from the properties of autonomous control and a framework is presented which integrates this key figure into the decision-making process. The results are evaluated based on the presented requirements. © 2018 Association for Computing Machinery.

Product-Service Systems (PSS) are a promising opportunity for manufacturing companies to realign their value creation process towards customer-oriented and resource efficient solutions. However, many companies still struggle to create new business models based on providing efficient solutions instead of physical products. The concept of PSS has been the subject of research for many years, yet there is a severe lack of utilizing the most crucial resource of the information age: Data. The authors propose products enriched with digital services based on customer data to develop a cohesive value proposition as the basis for business model innovation in manufacturing companies. © 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Even though research has suggested that supply chain agility and supply chain adaptability are distinct capabilities, little is known about their performance effects and about the contextual conditions under which they are effective. Based on a sample of 143 German firms, we empirically investigate the effects of supply chain agility and supply chain adaptability on cost performance and operational performance using hierarchical regression analysis. We ground our investigation in the dynamic capabilities view and contingency theory. We find that supply chain agility and supply chain adaptability positively affect both cost performance and operational performance. We further find evidence for a mediating role of supply chain agility in the links between supply chain adaptability and performance. Product complexity positively moderates the links between supply chain adaptability and cost performance, and supply chain adaptability and operational performance. The results contribute to the literature by offering a more nuanced understanding of the performance implications of supply chain agility and supply chain adaptability, thereby addressing the crucial question of why their benefits may or may not materialise under varying levels of product complexity. © 2014 Taylor & Francis.

There is ample anecdotal evidence suggesting that firms can experience serious losses from social, ecological or ethical problems that exist in their supply chains. So far, however, research on supply chain risk management has largely neglected these sustainability issues. Most importantly, little is known about how sustainability issues manifest themselves as risks and how they create losses for focal firms. Without an in-depth understanding of this materialization process, conceptualizations of sustainability risks will remain vague and effective management frameworks cannot be developed. We address this important research gap by means of a transdisciplinary approach and provide a concise description of how sustainability issues in supply chains materialize as risks for focal firms. Building on this mechanism and drawing on stakeholder theory, we develop a conceptualization of sustainability risks which lays the basis for future investigations in this respective field. In addition, we devise a viable management concept for sustainability-related supply chain risks. The proposed concept can help firms to mitigate sustainability issues in global supply chains, thus making them less vulnerable to losses resulting from these risks. Its application will also foster sustainability standards within supply chains. © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

The objective of this paper is to establish a theoretical foundation for financial supply chain management (FSCM) in order to strengthen managerial decisions concerning financial flows in supply chains. Although such decisions are made frequently and partial aspects of FSCM are already understood in business practice, empirical knowledge about FSCM is in its early stages. The study provides fundamental information derived from eight case studies based on 40 interviews. The analysis extends previous studies of the interface between operations management and finance by (i) contributing to a mid-range theory of FSCM by exploring two distinct but not exclusive FSCM categories, their antecedents, and performance effects, (ii) empirically deriving a testable framework for FSCM, (iii) relating FSCM to established theories in the field of SCM, and (iv) basing the analysis on transaction cost economics. Managerial insights reveal that weak working capital causes firms to focus on FSCM. More specifically, the study identifies two FSCM categories: pre-shipment FSCM (before invoice release) and post-shipment FSCM (after invoice release). Managers can improve upstream supply chain working capital with pre-shipment FSCM, whereas post-shipment FSCM strengthens the buying firm's working capital position. Based on transaction cost economics, we analyze how these improvements stem from risk reductions, which are more effective if firms are integrated internally and externally. © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

In two subprojects of the Priority Programme 1542 "Concrete light", which is funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), form findings of strut and tie-models and columns according to the principle "form follows force" were conducted. The article discusses the results of geometries, which are aligned with the direction of forces for a definite stability failure and different bearings. The form findings were taken with different procedures in both subprojects. The referring methods are explained and discussed in the following text. For the form finding a variation of the cross section as well as a variation of the form in longitudinal direction was analysed. Furthermore an insight in early researches to this topic, which began a long time ago, is given. After all, an aesthetic shape idea of the column geometry is considered. Copyright © 2013 Ernst & Sohn Verlag für Architektur und technische Wissenschaften GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin.

Logistics' contribution to corporate performance has increased over recent years, particularly due to supply chain innovations. Opposed to common innovations focusing on the improvement of product or information flow, supply chain finance (SCF) targets the financial flow and allows buying firms and their suppliers to improve working capital and reduce costs. However, the adoption process of SCF is complex and rather unexplored in academia. This article provides an early step in building knowledge about SCF and in particular how firms adopt SCF, why they adopt differently, and what role suppliers play in the adoption process. The objective was therefore to close the gap between our knowledge on product and information flow oriented innovations and financial flow innovations along the supply chain, namely SCF. For this explorative research, we opted for an inductive multiple case study approach with six European firms. Based on our findings, four sets of propositions are posited and an extended SCF adoption framework is proposed revolving around the interrelated adoption processes of buying firms and their corresponding supplier bases. © 2013 Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals.

The importance of purchasing and supply management (PSM) for corporate success has received a great deal of attention in recent years. Most research in this area has investigated PSMs contribution to the firm by directly linking its practices to corporate performance. In this paper, we develop strategic supply performance outcomes as an intermediate construct and investigate PSMs contribution to corporate performance through three performance levels in a multidimensional performance framework: supply performance drivers, strategic supply performance outcomes, and corporate performance outcomes. We apply a partial least squares analysis to evaluate the research model and test the hypotheses with data from 112 companies. The results indicate strong support for the proposed multidimensional performance framework. © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Getting a substantial value addition out of investments in purchasing and supply management (PSM) is of central importance to senior management. However, the empirical evidence of a financial value contribution is fragmented. The current study addresses this fragmentation by using a comprehensive performance measurement model to validate empirically (a) whether PSM contributes to the company's financial success and (b) whether the financial value contribution is mediated by benefits of three operational performances (cost, quality, and innovation performance). Our findings from an international survey of 306 major companies from eight industry sectors suggest that an advanced, comprehensive implementation of PSM activities contributes to an improvement in PSM outcomes, which in turn mediates company success. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd.