بررسی تاثیر یک تامین کننده وب سایت بر روی ارتباط خریدار - تامین کننده. مورد خودرو فراری

This article concentrates on the relationship between companies and their suppliers with a specific focus on the impact that information and communication technologies (ICTs) have on industrial (business to business) purchasing processes. After reviewing the extant literature, we classify the potential impact of ICTs on the buyer–supplier interactions into three main categories, i.e. impact on buyer–supplier relationship, impact on purchase process efficiency and impact on logistics process performance. Whilst scholars generally agree on the impact ICTs may have on buyer–supplier exchanges, they have not investigated concurrently all of these three impacts to understand their comparative relevance and the context in which this comparative relevance may change. In order to redress this gap in the literature our research study focuses on a particular form of ICT solution – supplier portals – and takes a supplier (rather than buyer) perspective. We explore empirical evidence from a single customer–multiple supplier case study, that of the Ferrari Auto supplier portal. Our study leads us to contend that suppliers view such portals as offering far more significant benefits to their relationship with customers than to the improvements in purchase process efficiency or to the performance of buyer–supplier logistics processes. We conclude with a short discussion of the main managerial implications and suggestions for future research.

In recent years, both academics and practitioners have underlined the importance of relationships in the business-to-business (b2b) context, increasingly sustaining that the contribution of strengthened relationships between buyers and suppliers yields improvements in both parties' business performance. A significant contribution to knowledge in business-to-business relationships comes from the work of the Industrial Marketing and Purchasing (IMP) Group. The central premise of this school of thought is to view business exchanges as embedded in a network distinguished by stable and interactive long term relationships ( Haakansson, 1982, Haakansson and Snehota, 1995, Gadde and Haakansson, 2001, Tuten and Urban, 2001, Leek et al., 2003 and Leek et al., 2003). The IMP Group has also argued for a shift from purchasing management to supplier relationship management ( Gadde & Snehota, 2000), intended to realize the benefits of moving from arms-length dealings to partnering ( Araujo, Dubois, & Gadde, 1999) and from adversarial to relational exchange ( Kalafatis, 2002). In the last decade the impact of Information and Communication Technologies (hereafter ICTs) on b2b relationships has been studied in some depth, primarily as a consequence of the rise of Internet or web-based e-business systems and processes. ICTs affect relationships because they have facilitated both an increase in disintermediation (separation or removal of previous links in supply chains) and used innovatively have led to new forms of relationships becoming possible (Naudè & Holland, 1996). The arrival of ICTs has also enabled the development of technological solutions which have a significant impact on the efficiency of the business processes. In particular, the diffusion of electronic procurement has contributed to improved efficiency of buyer–supplier transactions and related purchase order processes (Croom, 2000 and Croom, 2001). ICTs have also been seen to benefit the logistics processes in buyer–supplier interactions through both better management and control of the physical flows and better coordination and integration along the supply chain (Barratt & Oliveira, 2001). Although in general scholars agree on the impact ICTs have on the three above mentioned aspects – i.e. relationship, efficiency and logistics – of b2b exchanges, they have not investigated concurrently all of these three impacts to understand their comparative relevance and the context in which this comparative relevance may change. In this paper, we contribute to redress this gap in the literature by demonstrating that ICTs show a stronger impact on the relationship than on the purchase process efficiency or the logistics process performance of the buyer–supplier exchanges. Among the several ICTs solutions for purchasing, this study examines only one specific tool — web-based supplier portals. Portals represent a good context in which to investigate the impact that ICTs may have on relationship, efficiency and logistics in buyer–supplier interactions because they have been designed to simultaneously develop a collaborative relationship in the long term, manage the operation of the purchasing process and coordinate and control logistics flows. This article concentrates on a supplier perspective instead of a buyer one. This contrasts with the predominant view in much of the literature which has been largely concerned with the benefits and advantages arising for the buying company from the ICTs investment. In our opinion, the supplier's viewpoint in any buyer–seller dyad is both complementary and relevant to an investigation on the impact of the ICTs in the b2b context. This perspective aims at understanding whether the advantages the (buyer) company expects to gain from implementing such a portal generate perceived benefits for suppliers as well. The paper is organized as follows. We begin with a review of the literature relating to the nature, application and impact of ICTs in a b2b context, with a specific focus on supplier portals. Then, an overview of our research methodology is used to explain the relevance of the selected case study. A detailed discussion and analysis of the Ferrari portal case is provided, including the core findings from our study of suppliers' perceptions and experiences with the portal. The focus is, as stated, on exploring concurrently the three areas of interest in terms of the impact of the portal on relationships, efficiency and logistics. We then discuss the theoretical contribution of this study and some of the managerial implications are laid out. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the opportunities for future research arising from this article.

This study demonstrates that from the suppliers' viewpoint, supplier portals have a more relevant and stronger impact on relationships than on purchase process efficiency or logistics process performance. This evidence emerges from the analysis of a company operating in the automotive industry and particularly in the high end segment. The context in which we carried out our research provides a unique mix and balance of the critical success factors that characterize both the automakers and the fashion and luxury goods manufacturers. In the former industry, efficiency in purchasing and logistics and integration with suppliers – aiming at the development of collaborative practices – are relevant critical success factors. In the latter industry, brand management and sense of belonging to a unique network are considered strategic issues. The case we investigated is representative of these two different environments and consequently we deem our findings can be considered meaningful also in other industries with similar characteristics. In those contexts where process innovation is strategically prevailing (for example chips and semiconductors, steel, plastics etc.) and efficiency is the dominant success factor, the supplier portal could have different impacts in comparison with our evidence. Our research has been focused on a specific ICT solution, the supplier portal. As discussed in the theoretical contributions, ICTs solutions can be divided between those that are transaction-oriented, through the automation of the business processes, and those that are collaborative-oriented, through the improvement of the intra- and interfirm information sharing. Supplier portals belong to the second group. Therefore, the evidence of our study cannot be fully broadened to the transactional ICTs solutions (for example, order fulfillment, e-auctions, catalog hub etc.) which are mainly focused on efficiency recovery. This study contains several limitations that stimulate consideration of further research. One of the limitations of the study concerns the fact that the paper is centered on a single-case study (albeit with a large sample of supplier respondents). Additional cases in different industries are required to fully generalize our conclusions. Another limitation involves the measures we used to evaluate the impacts of the supplier portal. We acknowledge the fact that we employed single-items indicators because of Ferrari's request not bothering suppliers with a long questionnaire. Further research should improve the validity of our findings with multi-item measures, based on extant literature on relationship, efficiency and logistics in b2b context.