Outsourcing, Supplier Relations and Internationalisation: Global Sourcing Strategy as a Chinese Puzzle Defended on Thursday, 13 December 2001

This thesis deals conceptually and empirically with the important question of how firms can obtain competitive advantage through managing their inputs. It investigates the performance effects of three dimensions of sourcing strategy: outsourcing, supplier relations and internationalisation. Sourcing strategy has become a topic of increasing interest for both practitioners and academics. Quantitative analysis techniques are used to study managerial decision-making in the Dutch manufacturing sector. One important overall conclusion is that managers tend to overestimate the efficiency of vertical markets for the provision of inputs at the expense of organising.

Keywords

firms, suppliers, sourcing, internationalization, marketing, competitors, costs, industry, outsourcing, managers, survey, economy, trust, foreign, responsiveness, purchasing, economic performance, external sourcing, country, productivity, networks, literature, moderators, correlations, dimensions, reasons, buyers, European, asset specificity, dependent, innovations, global sourcing


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