Improving Supply Chain Management with Advanced Planning and Scheduling : Effects and possibilities with an international perspective

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Companies are more and more moving to low wage regions like Eastern Europe and Asia to stay competitive. Instead of lowering the cost of production, it has been argued that a company can stay competitive through making the use of the resources more efficient. In this study the effects a German resource saving concept, involving reorganization towards processes and an Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS) module, has on Supply Chain Management (SCM) are investigated. In addition to this a comparison between German best-practice companies and Swedish companies has been done. This comparison was conducted in order to determine the changes needed to be made when taking this German concept to Swedish companies.The results of this study indicate that through the German resource saving concept major improvements in delivery performance, responsiveness, supply chain costs, and asset management can be achieved. Further, this study has shown that there are very good possibilities for Swedish companies at reaching these improvements successfully. Barriers to a success in Sweden include a lack of managerial commitment and hierarchies as well as outsourced IT departments at Swedish companies. Recomm...