Title: Information systems in supply chain management: a comparative case study of three organisations

Authors: Girish H. Subramanian, Abdullah C. Iyigungor

Addresses: School of Business, E355 Olmsted Building, Penn State Harrisburg, 777 W. Harrisburg Pike, Middletown, PA 17057, USA. ' School of Business, E355 Olmsted Building, Penn State Harrisburg, 777 W. Harrisburg Pike, Middletown, PA 17057, USA

Abstract: Supply Chain Management (SCM) is recognised as a core competitive strategy for businesses in almost every industry. A strong supply chain provides products and services to consumers faster, cheaper, and better. The paper discusses SCM and information systems in the supply chain. Case studies of Wal-Mart, Amazon.Com and United Parcel Services (UPS) and their use of information systems in the supply chain are presented. Wal-Mart and Amazon have established critical and timely strategies in their supply chains through huge investments in Information Technology (IT). While Wal-Mart and Amazon are offering their products to consumers, UPS offers logistics solutions to clients. These companies use a variety of information technologies which include satellite systems, barcodes, web-based Electronic Data Interchange (EDI), Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), data warehousing, and e-commerce in their supply chain. The supply chain and use of these technologies in SCM are reviewed and compared for these three organisations.

Keywords: information technology; supply chain management; SCM; information systems applications; e-commerce; electronic commerce; web-based EDI; electronic data interchange; internet; third-party logistics; 3PL; inventory reduction; cycle time reduction; information flow; price reduction; satellite systems; barcodes; radio frequency identification; RFID; data warehousing; Wal-Mart; Amazon; United Parcel Services; UPS.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBIS.2006.008955

International Journal of Business Information Systems, 2006 Vol.1 No.4, pp.370 - 386

Published online: 07 Feb 2006 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article