Sustainable Enterprise Performance

3The Process of Product and Service Production

3.1. The strategic importance of the “supply chain” within digital development

The “supply chain” is the logistic chain spanning from taking customer orders to delivering the ordered product or service and receiving the corresponding payment. The supply chain has always been crucial because it is here that all options taken during the strategy and development phase of the product offer are solidified, and where the relationship with the business’ customers takes place, determining their degree of satisfaction.

It is inseparable from the strategy because it is not enough to decide on “good things to do”, but we must also “do them well!” This goes for other way around as well.

However, with the accelerated development of “digital” technological innovations, performant and competitive “supply chain” management becomes more and more strategic, under penalty of leaving the market. As such, Amazon is a particularly illustrative example: they have been able to combine a range of new services by drawing on digitalization and the logistic chain’s performance by very quickly integrating all useful innovations: robotizing of transfers, the Internet of Things (IoT), and even drones.

A good command of technology, which has an enormous impact on the “supply chain”, is clearly a major competitive factor that can “disrupt” the balance of forces at play on a market. Never in history has innovation had as much of an impact on the production of goods ...