Supply Risk Research Articles

Effects of network structures on the production planning in closed-loop supply chains – A case study based analysis for lithium-ion batteries in Europe

The increasing demand for electric vehicles and related lithium-ion batteries leads to the implementation of battery production in Europe. Recently, legal obligations, high material prices, and supply risk of battery materials induced OEMs to set up recycling facilities or cooperate with battery recyclers. Different network structures emerged in this process. However, it remains unclear how the network structures influence the performance in the short-term. Therefore, a novel multi-stage, multi-product, multi-period production planning approach for closed-loop supply chains of lithium-ion batteries is developed. The model considers a spatial distribution of collection, recycling, repurposing, and production. Furthermore, the facilities of the OEM and suppliers a considered simultaneously. The collection is further divided into cost-free take-back of spent batteries and purchase of additional batteries. This approach enables the stakeholders of the closed-loop supply chain to counteract material shortages or price fluctuations. Subsequently, the effects of different network structures are analyzed based on a case study for closed-loop supply chains of lithium-ion batteries in Europe. The results indicate that centralized and decentralized networks can achieve adequate performance. In this context, the transformation toward closed-loop supply chains is beneficial for all network structures. Furthermore, circular factories outperform all network structures in the short term due to the in-house production of batteries and short transportation distances.

A supply risk perspective integrated sustainable supplier selection model in the intuitionistic fuzzy environment.

With the recent focus on supply risk management in sustainable supply chains, it is more important than ever to evaluate and select the right sustainable suppliers from a supply risk perspective. However, few existing studies consider supply risks from the perspective of all three triple-bottom-line dimensions at the same time. To bridge this research gap, this research constructs a supply risk perspective integrated sustainable supplier selection model in the intuitionistic fuzzy environment. First of all, the weights of decision-makers in the decision-making group are obtained by intuitionistic fuzzy set. Secondly, after obtaining the aggregated intuitionistic fuzzy decision matrix considering the weight of decision-makers, the fuzzy entropy weight method is used to calculate criteria weight, objectively. Then, an improved failure mode and effects analysis is used to undertake risk assessments and to identify high-risk suppliers. Last but not least, the extended alternative queuing method is adopted to rank the eligible sustainable suppliers in the intuitionistic fuzzy environment. The proposed model not only reduces the uncertainty of decision-making in sustainable supplier selection, but also enables focal companies to reduce supply risk in their sustainable supplier selection practices and prevent the failure modes that relate to supply risk. The practicality and effectiveness of the proposed model are verified through an empirical illustration in a leading electrical appliance manufacturer in China.

Customer concentration and firm risk: The role of outside directors from a major customer

This paper examines the role of customer-affiliated outside directors on suppliers in reducing risk arising from having a major customer. Using a sample of US supplier firms, we find that a positive relationship between having a major customer and supplier risk is weakened with the presence of the major customer's representatives at suppliers' board. We further show that suppliers with customer-affiliated outside directors are more likely to have less conservative financial policies. Our results suggest that customers' board membership at suppliers helps mitigate the business risk due to the tightened supplier–customer relationship and reduced information asymmetry.

Моделювання комплексного формування запасів військової техніки в зоні воєнного конфлікту з використанням компонентного методу

The task of researching the multi-component composition of military equipment (tanks, artillery, aviation equipment, etc.) for supplying and forming the necessary stockpiles of weapons and their components in the military conflict zone to establish military parity of forces, is developed and solved. The research relevance is related to a comprehensive solution to the problem of forming the necessary stockpiles of weapons and their components in the combat zone, under the conditions of military threats. The purpose of this study is to use the component method to represent weapons and their components in the process of complex supply of military equipment to the combat zone for creating military parity of forces. The problems of the supply of weapons and their components in martial law conditions, which are associated with the complex multi-component structure of military equipment, the limited capabilities of manufacturers and suppliers of weapons, and the logistical risks of supply in conditions of military threats, are analyzed. A multi-layered component structure of military equipment is proposed for the systematic presentation of weapons and their components in the process of supply and formation of reserves in the combat zone. The logistics of the weapons and their component supply from army warehouses and military equipment from manufacturers’ warehouses are analyzed. The limited capabilities of manufacturers and suppliers of military equipment lead to the complication of the formation of necessary military equipment stockpiles in the military conflict zone, which can affect the nature of hostilities (transition from offensive to defensive actions). The lack of military equipment leads to the need to form defense orders for the creation and production of new types of weapons, including those with increased combat capability characteristics (range, accuracy, damage zone, etc.). Therefore, for the creation of new weapons or the modernization of existing models, it is proposed to use the multi-component architecture of a modern model of military equipment, considering the possible types of components (reusable, adaptive, new). An algorithm for the formation of a multi-component and multi-layered architecture of modern weapons using a precedent approach is proposed. For this, a precedent database is created, which is used to search for existing reusable components. Both quantitative and qualitative assessments of proximity are used in the process of searching in the database of precedents to assess the proximity of components. The model was created to optimize the logistic costs of supplying weapons and their components to the combat zone. The quantities of weapons and their components, the time of supply, and the risks of supply in conditions of military threats are used as supply indicators. The requirements for the supply of military equipment in the conditions of the risks of martial law are formed. The scientific novelty of the study is related to the component method use, which is used to form the logistics of the supply of weapons and their components to the military conflict zone, considering the limited capabilities of manufacturers and suppliers of military equipment in conditions of threats of martial law. The results of the study should be used to model the plans and logistics of supplying weapons and their components to the combat zone to create military parity of forces.

High concentration from resources to market heightens risk for power lithium-ion battery supply chains globally

Global low-carbon contracts, along with the energy and environmental crises, have encouraged the rapid development of the power battery industry. As the current first choice for power batteries, lithium-ion batteries have overwhelming advantages. However, the explosive growth of the demand for power lithium-ion batteries will likely cause crises such as resource shortages and supply-demand imbalances. This study adopts qualitative and quantitative research methods to comprehensively evaluate the power lithium-ion battery supply and demand risks by analyzing the global material flow of these batteries. The results show that the processes from resources to market of the power lithium-ion battery industry are highly concentrated with growing trends. The proportion of the top three power lithium-ion battery-producing countries grew from 71.79% in 2016 to 92.22% in 2020, increasing by 28%. The top three power lithium-ion battery-demand countries accounted for 83.07% of the demand in 2016 and 88.16% in 2020. The increasing concentration increases the severity of the supply risk. The results also imply that different processes are concentrated within different countries or regions, and the segmentation puts the development of the power lithium-ion battery industry at significant risk. It is urgent to address this situation so that this severe risk can be ameliorated.

Supply Chain Risk Management in a Digital Era: Evidence from SMEs of Clothing Retailers in Australia

With the increased globalisation and disruptions faced by businesses in this digital era and the occurrence of natural disasters such as floods and disease outbreaks in the world, supply chain risks and management of those risks are major challenges for businesses, especially for SMEs of clothing retailers in Australia. This study, hence, is carried out using an exploratory case study research method, and the data have been collected through semi-structured face-to-face interviews with key informants from managerial levels of 20 Australian SMEs of clothing retailing businesses to identify various supply chain risks and their management processes. This study finds five supply chain risks, namely supply risk, demand risk, financial risk, environmental risk, and operational risk, that the SMEs of clothing retailers mostly face in the supply chain. This study also finds that most of the investigated retailers lack a formal risk identification approach, though they informally use the reactive and proactive methods of risk identification. Furthermore, the assessment methods are not well established in most of the participating firms, and supplier monitoring receives more attention compared to their own performance to deal with their supply chain risks. This study contributes to the body of knowledge by being one of the first empirical studies to explore the SMEs of clothing retailers’ supply chain risks and their management processes in the Australian business context, which can add value in guiding supply chain design decisions for SMEs in other sectors.

Unbalanced global vaccine product trade pattern: A network perspective

Mass vaccination is the most cost-effective intervention in response to public health events. Thus, equitable access to vaccine products is essential to ensure global human health. Based on the global vaccine product trade data from 2000 to 2018 and employing social network analysis, this paper explores the unbalanced pattern of global vaccine product trade and assesses the sensitivity interdependence between countries. Overall, the analysis shows that global vaccine product trade links have long been highly concentrated within developed countries in Europe and America. Nevertheless, with the rise of global and regional hub countries, the global vaccine product trade network has begun to evolve from a unipolar structure with the U.S. as the sole core to a multipolar structure with the U.S. and Western European countries as the core. Meanwhile, emerging countries, represented by China and India, are increasingly participating in the global vaccine product trade network and are beginning to play an important role. The formation of this multipolar pattern has provided countries in the Global South with more options for cooperation in the vaccine product trade and reduces the sensitivity interdependence of network periphery countries on core countries, which consequently reduces the global supply risk of vaccine products.

Spatiotemporal Changes in the Watershed Ecosystem Services Supply and Demand Relationships in the Eastern Margin of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

Clarifying the spatiotemporal changes in the supply and demand relationship of ecosystem services (ESs) is essential for optimizing ESs management. However, several studies have reported the ESs supply and demand risk in complex mountainous areas. In this study, we quantitatively analyzed the spatiotemporal variation in ESs supply, demand, and their trade-off and synergy, including water yield, soil conservation, and food provision in the Bailongjiang watershed (BLJW) in western China. The results showed that the total supply and demand of water-yield and soil-conservation services rose with a surplus from 2002 to 2018, except for food provision. A high value characterizes the water-yield and soil-conservation supply in the south, but there are low values in the east BLJW. The spatial distribution of water and food supply–demand featured a high demand in the subareas with population aggregation. Soil-conservation demand is high in the northwest and south of Wudu. The dominant spatial matching type of supply and demand in water yield was a high supply with a low demand. Soil conservation was associated with a low supply and low demand, and food provision with a high supply and increased demand. A synergy existed between water yield and soil conservation. Trade-offs existed between water yield, food provision, and soil conservation. The spatial distribution of trade-off intensity showed distinctive patterns. The supply–demand ratio of WY and SC decreased with the increasing trade-off intensity. This study comprehensively considers ES and supply–demand conflicts, thus providing a new perspective and approach for enhancing ecosystem services and high-quality regional development.

Ripple effect of disruptions on performance in supply chains: an empirical study

PurposeThe present study is performed to identify the propagation mechanism of the ripple effect as well as examine the simultaneous impact of risks on supply chain (SC) performance.Design/methodology/approachA theoretical framework with many hypotheses regarding the relationships between SC risk types and performance is established. The data are collected from a large-scale survey supported by a project of the Japanese government to promote sustainable socioeconomic development for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region, with the participation of 207 firms. Structural equation modeling (SEM) is used to test the hypotheses of the theoretical framework.FindingsIt is indicated that human-made risk causes operational risk, while natural risk causes both supply risk and operational risk. Furthermore, the impacts of human-made risk and natural risk on performance are amplified through operational risk.Research limitations/implicationsThis study is one of the first attempts that identifies the propagation mechanism of the ripple effect and examines the simultaneous impact of risks on performance in construction SCs.Originality/valueAlthough many studies on risk management in construction SCs have been carried out, they mainly focus on risk identification or quantification of risk impact. It is observed that research on the ripple effect of disruptions has been very scarce.

Influence of supply chain risks on project financial performance

Facing more frequent and severe disruptions, risk management in supply chains (SCs) has received considerable attention and extensive research. Yet, insights on how changes in SC risks (SCRs) influence project financial performance remain underdeveloped. In this study, we investigate the relationships among industry-specific risk, organizational risk, project SCRs, and project financial performance from the viewpoint of marginal risk product (MRP) using longitudinal project survey data. Structural equation modeling shows that project SCR factors completely negatively mediate the connections among industry-specific risk, organizational risk, and project financial performance. The presence of this full mediation implies that industry-specific risk and organizational risk only indirectly negatively influence project financial performance. Further analysis reveals that industry-specific risk influences project financial performance mainly through project internal-process integration risk, whereas organizational risk's influence is mostly through project demand and internal-process integration risks. A direct implication is that managers who want to increase project financial performance by enhancing the management performance of industry-specific risk and organizational risk should also enhance the management performance of project demand and internal process integration risks to magnify their impact. Analysis also shows that project internal process integration risk and project demand risk possess the largest and the next-largest negative MRP effects on project financial performance, respectively, despite both having no indirect effects. Future research should further clarify the nonsignificant mediating effects of project supply risk on industry-specific risk and organizational risk, although possible explanations are provided.

Risk in sustainable construction supply chains: construct development and measurement validation

Although previous studies have focused on different aspects of green/sustainability risk in construction supply chains (SCs) such as identification of risks or the linkage between characteristics of stakeholders and risk assessment, research on this topic is still quite limited. One important reason for this limitation is the absence of valid and reliable measurement of risk, resulting in the impossibility to discriminate between risk constructs. Therefore, the current study is performed to develop and then validate a measurement scale of risk in sustainable construction SCs. The data are collected from a large-scale survey supported by the Japanese government to promote sustainable socioeconomic development for the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) region, with the participation of 283 firms in Vietnam. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) are used to test the reliability, convergent validity, and discriminant validity of the risk constructs. The results indicate that all tests strongly support the measurement scale, and seven reliable risk constructs are identified including supply, demand, internal processes, information, financial, time, and environmental risks. This study also presents opportunities for further developing research on risk management (especially the three phases: risk assessment, risk mitigation, and risk monitoring) in sustainable construction SCs.

Dimensions of supply risks in the supply of water: A case of Zet district municipality

The purpose of the study is to ascertain water supply risks in a district municipality, in South Africa. It aims to strike a balance between the risk of water supply and demand within the Zet District Municipality’s capacity for integrated water service delivery. Inductive thematic analysis and in-depth interviews with district administrators were used to collect qualitative data as part of an exploratory case study design. The findings from the interpretive philosophy reveal that district municipalities lack the capacity to deliver water services due to a variety of supply chain risks and augmenting water demand from the community. Due to the detrimental effects of water shortages on livelihoods, the district's supply risk management capacities need to be strengthened. The supply chain operations should mitigate supply risks not just in water supply, but in service delivery as a whole by striking a balance between water demand and supply to address supply risks. The supply risks that are recognised should take into account data sharing, supplier agility, adaptability, dependability, and infrastructure quality. The force field analysis created a platform to identify the forces that provide a change in the water supply.

The importance of land in resource criticality assessment methods: A first step towards characterising supply risk

Land is a key resource for human activities under growing pressure. Resource criticality assessment methods investigate the extent to which a resource may become a limiting factor according to various dimensions, including geological, economic and geopolitical availability. They have been applied to resources like minerals, fossil fuels, biotic material or water, but none consider land resources, i.e. natural land units providing space and support for human activities. Based on two recognised criticality methods developed by i) the Yale University and ii) the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, this study aims to develop spatialized land supply risk indexes at country level. The accessibility of raw resources can be quantified and compared using the supply risk index. The specific characteristics of land call for certain adaptations of the criticality approach, and are designed to ensure comparability between resources. The main adaptations include the definition of land stress and the internal land concentration index. Land stress represents the physical availability of land, while internal land concentration relates to the concentration of landowners within a country. Finally, land supply risk indexes are computed for 76 countries, including 24 European countries for which the results of the two criticality methods are compared. Comparison points to divergences in the countries ranking for land accessibility, thus underlining the importance of methodological choices in the construction of the indexes. Data quality is discussed for European countries with the JRC method, and the use of alternative data sources reveals that it may lead to differences in absolute values, although the ranking of countries with low or high land supply risk does not change.Finally, this work covers a gap in criticality methods by including land resources. These resources can be critical for certain countries, and are essential for human activities such as food or energy production.

Credibility-based cascading approach to achieve net-zero emissions in energy symbiosis networks using an Organic Rankine Cycle

Industrial symbiosis (IS) integrates multiple industries to share resources (e.g., energy, water, by-materials) for economic and environmental reasons. Energy demand is dynamic, imposing financial and logistical barriers to achieving Circular Energy (CEn). This paper addresses this by proposing a new framework that integrates central heating networks of an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) system to recover unused low-temperature energy. The framework is formulated as a stochastic programming problem to capture the uncertainty of some parameters to reduce the costs arising from fluctuations in energy supply and demand and, subsequently, wasted energy. Disruption management is also applied to handle the risk of suppliers becoming unavailable due to unforeseen events. The proposed multi-objective mixed-integer linear programming model optimizes the conflicting sustainability value preferences in the IS-based CEn network. The paper presents a novel robust possibilistic programming technique to control the epistemic uncertainty of the developed mode and develops a robust variant of the augmented ε-constraint algorithm (AUGMECON-R) to obtain the Pareto optimal solutions. The results provide a new platform for reducing the undesirable effects of worst-case energy symbiosis scenarios. The results show that using ORCs in an IS network increases the economic benefits of such a system by about 20% and reduces customer dissatisfaction from energy supply disruptions by about 27%.

Determination of Logistics Risk of Palm Cooking Oil Using Fuzzy Delphi Method and Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process

Determination of risk sources and risk indicators is carried out by conducting literature studies and expert assessments. The results of the expert assessment are processed using the Delphi fuzzy and AHP fuzzy methods. The Delphi fuzzy method is used to make decisions regarding risk sources and risk indicators based on expert opinion. The AHP fuzzy method is used to determine the weight and priority order of risk sources and risk indicators for palm cooking oil logistics. The risk sources obtained based on the study of the literature are as many as 10 risk sources which are then selected 8 risks that are approved by experts. While the risk indicators obtained based on the study of the literature are as many as 34 indicators, then as many as 23 indicators are considered important by experts. Based on the risk weight assessment, the order of risk with the highest weight is supply risk with a weight of 0.2803, partnership risk with a weight of 0.1619, production risk with a weight of 0.1576, storage risk with a weight of 0.1262, technology risk with weight of 0.93, transportation risk with a weight of 0.0811, infrastructure risk with a weight of 0.0603 and market risk with a weight of 0.0395.

A Mixed-Method Approach to Determine the Successful Factors Affecting the Criticality Level of Intermediate and Final Products on National Basis: A Case Study from Saudi Arabia

COVID-19, Brexit, war, and some other similar cases will leave/have left us with a lesson that has had an impact on the supply chains of almost all product types. Countries have now recognized that some products cannot be sustained in a situation of uncertainty. This research covers the gap in understanding and identifying the successful factors affecting the criticality level of supply required of intermediate and final products (IFP) at the national level. It investigates the relationship between two factors: the casual factor supply risk (independent factor); and the impacted (dependent factors) political, economic, sociocultural, and technological (PEST) factors in terms of identifying critical products using the principle of Resource Dependency Theory (RDT). A literature review was conducted, followed by a mixed-method approach. Semi-structured interviews with 23 Saudi experts were carried out initially; then, a questionnaire was shared with 152 Saudi experts in different sectors. The qualitative study identified 30 key measurement variables for both factors, in which 19 variables were confirmed using the factor analysis (FA) technique.

A comparative framework for criticality assessment of strategic raw materials in Turkey

The rapid development of innovative technologies, population growth, shifting resource management patterns, and decarbonization challenges are expected to increase the demand for raw materials labeled as critical in the following years. The increasing concerns have led to evaluate the critical raw materials (CRMs) with high economic importance and supply risk. In this context, this paper aims to develop a conceptual methodology to identify CRMs in Turkey. The methodology integrates a multi-criteria decision-making method (MCDM) to provide the raw material criticality matrix regarding various criteria, the EU (European Union) method, which represents supply risk and economic importance indicators, and the time series analysis method, in which dynamic evaluation of materials over time instead of the static indicators. We first provide a Bayesian Best-Worst method (B-BWM) and TOPSIS (Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution) based model for the criticality matrix, which enables evaluations of participated experts to be combined to reveal the weights of the criteria and sub-criteria from a probabilistic point of view without loss of knowledge. The main and sub-criteria include supply risk and economic importance, which are frequently studied in the literature, but also environment, price, secondary production, and socio-economic indicators are evaluated in the criticality matrix. Then, exponential smoothing forecast, one of the Time Series Analysis models, which determine the element criticality in the perspective of future years with the data of import figures of Turkey, is superior to the other models. Finally, with some modifications, the EU criticality methodology is used to quantify the raw materials regarding each material associated with the sector applications and their value-added and supply disruptions. Thus, a comprehensive criticality list integrating the results of the three mentioned methods is important because Turkey's raw materials characterize many sectors. The findings should also interest practitioners and researchers as the detailed assessment of raw material criticality ensures a sufficient database for future studies.

A comparative assessment of value chain criticality of lithium-ion battery cells

As the global transport sector ramps up the transition towards electromobility, the value chain of raw materials for lithium-ion battery (LIB) development is becoming crucial. Assessing the criticality of material value chains identifies potential supply risks within these value chains and can better inform battery technology development. This study uses the ESSENZ method to systematically assess eleven (11) criticality aspects of ten (10) LIB cells. The criticality scores of the LIB cells are evaluated by aggregating the criticality scores of eleven (11) constituent value chains. These criticality scores are further complemented by twelve (12) environmental midpoint impacts performed using life cycle assessments. For the value chains, cobalt dominates the criticality scores in political stability, mining capacity, trade barriers, the feasibility of exploration projects, and the occurrence of co-production. Lithium dominates the criticality scores in demand growth, concentration of reserves, concentration of production, and primary material used. Nickel dominates the criticality scores in price volatility, while natural graphite dominates the criticality scores in company concentration. We further explain in our results the reasons driving the criticalities in the value chains. For the comparative LIB cell assessment, we developed a quadrant matrix chart depicting the relative performance of the LIB cells based on their aggregated elemental criticality and environmental impact scores. This analysis identifies LIB cells with low value chain criticality and environmental scores and those that need improvements on either the criticality or the environmental impact scores. We propose a series of measures, such as the transition towards cobalt-free batteries, material efficiency improvements, and end-of-life recycling to alleviate the criticality and environmental impacts associated with these LIB cells. This research emphasizes the need to include all sustainability dimensions for comprehensive and holistic insights to positively shape the course of action towards sustainable LIB production systems.

A global analysis of potential self-sufficiency and diversity displays diverse supply risks

International trade plays a fundamental role in today's globalized food system, however, trade-related disruptions to national food supply have become increasingly prevalent. Although national food self-sufficiency and the resilience of domestic food production are both increasingly discussed, they are rarely investigated in tandem. This hinders our understanding of the diversity of risks to national food supply. In this article we investigate the contribution of production to these risks, through the compilation of a comprehensive national production dataset and a multi-indicator assessment of self-sufficiency and diversity. Our results show that most of the world (127 countries and territories, 87% of the global population) achieves high levels of potential self-sufficiency (≥6 nutrients fulfilled), however only 33% of the world population (41 countries) are fully self-sufficient. Of countries with high levels of self-sufficiency, fruit and vegetable production (a proxy for many micronutrients) is the most common “missing” sufficiency. 66 countries (6% of population) have a low degree of self-sufficiency, highlighting potential vulnerability to trade-related disruptions. The relationship between sufficiency and diversity is not homogeneous, highlighting that some production systems are reliant on very few products.

Wear behavior of innovative niobium carbide cutting tools in ultrasonic-assisted finishing milling

The resources of niobium exceed the ones of tungsten by an order of magnitude. With 92%, Brazil is today the main global producer of niobium. Hence, niobium carbides (NbC) are a sustainable and economic alternative to conventionally used cutting materials, especially tungsten carbides (WC). Moreover, NbC can be used in Ni alloy matrix and thus offer significant advantages by substituting WC in Co matrix as cutting materials in terms of health risks and raw material price and supply risk. Based on recent studies which found an increased performance of NbC compared to WC cutting tools in machining higher strength steels, the composition NbC12Ni4Mo4VC was chosen for finish machining of a high-strength steel S960QL in this study. The experiments were carried out on an ultrasonic-assisted 5-axis milling machine using NbC tools specially made to benchmark them with commercially available coated WC cutting inserts. In addition, the influence of a coating system for the NbC inserts is tested and evaluated for its performance in the cutting process. Tool wear and cutting force analyses are implied to identify optimal parameter combinations as well as tool properties for the novel NbC tool. Together with the oscillation of ultrasonic-assisted milling, the loads on the component surface and the tool can be reduced and the wear behavior of the novel NbC tool can be refined. These milling tests are accompanied by standardized wear tests, i.e., pin-on-disc, between the aforementioned material combinations, and the results are correlated with each other. Finally, the behavior when using hard-to-cut materials such as Ni alloys, or innovative materials such as iron aluminide is also being tested, as these are constantly in the focus of machining optimization. With this strategy, comprehensive knowledge is achievable for future efficient application of NbC for milling tools, which have already been researched for decades using WC.