Investigating Supply Chains Models and Enabling Technologies Towards Collaborative Networks

This research employs an extensive multiple case studies analysis to identify the most important business models affecting supply chain configurations and related enabling technologies towards the creation of collaborative networks. The results obtained from the investigation of 24 companies of manufacturing and process industry, informed by literature, identify four ‘design principles’ of business models, i.e. Personalized production, Servitization, Decentralized and modular production, and Recycle, Re-use and Sustainability. Each model is further described and discussed at the interplay between digitalization and collaborative network practices at supply chain level, showing that adopting one or a combination of the four design principles allows to actuate some of the most important features of collaboration like Vertical integration or networking of smart production systems, Horizontal integration through global value chain networks, Through-engineering across the entire value chain, Acceleration of manufacturing and Digitalization of products and services.