Business Success with Open Source

Supply Chain Defined

Supply chains are everywhere and touch upon pretty much everything in our modern lives. For instance, let’s consider a video game console.

Ore is extracted from a mine and then is sent to a refinery. The resulting material goes to a chip fabricator, who sends the finished computing chips to a factory to be assembled into a game console. The console then heads to a retailer, where you buy it and bring it home. Congrats on your shiny new video game console! This chain is depicted in the figure.

This example is obviously simplified but still portrays several links in this supply chain. Upon closer inspection, you’ll find that ...