E‐supply chains – virtually non‐existing

Abstract

There is rapidly growing interest in e‐businesses. Its impact on supply chains is currently covered in about 150 papers and articles and the number is growing at the speed of computing power. Unfortunately, most of the published work, in research and practice, is biased to e‐commerce and sales and marketing. The supply chain dimension of e‐business is largely neglected and managed poorly, while basic logistics mal‐performance is currently hampering turnover and revenues of e‐commerce applications severely. If basic operational performance is not even assured, more advanced approaches of e‐business will not take off, simply because there is inadequate support for the concepts in the physical domaine. Very often virtual integration is applied in an operational manner and in segments of the supply chain only, as opposed to an alternative approach developed here, that of strategic and integral supply chain involvement. This research note calls for an effort to make the supply chain dimension of e‐business a reality and suggests practical approaches (create an e‐supply chain which is a supply chain that can fulfill orders and assure supply in the physical sphere) to avoid the common trap of a neglected and poorly designed and managed supply chain.