The Impact of Supply Chain Integration on Mass Customization Capability: An Extended Resource-Based View

• Published in: IEEE transactions on engineering management Vol. 59; no. 3; pp. 443 - 456
• Main Authors: Fujun Lai, Min Zhang, Lee, D. M. S., Xiande Zhao
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.08.2012; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Collaboration; Competitive intensity; Customization; demand uncertainty; extended resource-based view (ERBV); Lieferkette; Manufacturers; Manycountries; Mass Customization; mass customization capability (MCC); Organizations; Resource management; Ressourcenorientierter Ansatz; Studies; Suppliers; supply chain integration (SCI); Supply chain management; Supply chains; Uncertainty; Wettbewerb
• ISSN: 0018-9391; 1558-0040
• DOI: 10.1109/TEM.2012.2189009

This study investigates two key issues: 1) how internal integration, customer integration, supplier integration, and the interplay among them jointly influence the development of mass customization capability (MCC), and 2) how environmental conditions (i.e., demand uncertainty and competitive intensity) moderate the impacts of supply chain integration on this development. Based on the extended resource-based view (ERBV) of the firm and contingency theory, we build a conditional indirect model and test it using a dataset of 289 manufacturers from nine countries. Our results are consistent with the ERBV, showing that internal integration not only has a significant direct effect on MCC, but also plays a central and strategic role in building customer and supplier integration. However, although customer integration is found to improve MCC directly, supplier integration appears to have no significant impact. Finally, internal integration has a positive indirect effect on MCC through customer integration, and this indirect effect is amplified when demand is uncertain and competition is intense.