Impact of New Technology and Sourcing Practices in Managing Tactical and Strategic Manufacturing Flexibilities - An Empirical Study

Abstract

Manufacturing flexibility is widely recognized as a critical component to achieve a competitive advantage in the market place and improves an organization capability to respond to customer demands without incurring excessive time and cost penalties. The objective of this paper is to understand and explicate the interaction between advanced manufacturing technology, sourcing practices and manufacturing flexibilities and assess their relative impact on different flexibilities. This research reports the findings of an exploratory study of North Indian medium and large scale manufacturing organizations, which are in the process of achieving the manufacturing flexibilities at various levels by acquiring, developing or utilizing the advanced manufacturing technology or by the use of specific sourcing practice. The statistical results suggest significant relationships among sourcing practices, advanced manufacturing technology and manufacturing flexibilities at different levels of manufacturing flexibility. The results also suggest that an organization could deploy specific sourcing practices or advanced manufacturing technologies to target specific manufacturing flexibility in pursuit of agility-based competitive advantages.