Title: Conceptual study on 3PL/4PL/ new trends for service industry

Authors: V.P. Vinay, Govindan Kannan, P. Sasikumar

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, St. Josephs College of Engineering and Technology, Palai – 686579, Kerala, India. ' Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark. ' Department of Production Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli – 620015, Tamilnadu, India

Abstract: The importance of customer service is increasing with the impact of globalisation. In any supply chain philosophy adopted firm, logistics play a key role in customer service. As the complexity of logistics increases in the global trading, the corporate are in need of novel and innovative concepts like third party logistics. This paper discusses the concepts of supply chain, logistics, the need for the novel trends for logistics outsourcing, the newer terms like Fifth Party Logistics Providers (5PLP) and Seventh Party Logistics (7PL), benefits and the barriers of 3PLP implementation are highlighted.

Keywords: customer service; 3PL; third party logistics providers; 4PL; fourth party logistics providers; 5PL; fifth party logistics providers; supply chain management; SCM; seventh party logistics; 7PL; services; service industry; logistics outsourcing.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSTM.2009.025033

International Journal of Services Technology and Management, 2009 Vol.12 No.1, pp.3 - 22

Published online: 10 May 2009 *

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