Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, 1999.

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Novak, Sharon (Economist)
Other Authors: Steven D. Eppinger and Charles H. Fine.
Format: Thesis
Language:eng
Published: Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2005
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/9773
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author Novak, Sharon (Economist)
author2 Steven D. Eppinger and Charles H. Fine.
author_facet Steven D. Eppinger and Charles H. Fine.
Novak, Sharon (Economist)
author_sort Novak, Sharon (Economist)
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description Thesis (Ph.D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, 1999.
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spelling mit-1721.1/97732020-04-24T12:56:02Z Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain Product architecture and the supply chain Novak, Sharon (Economist) Steven D. Eppinger and Charles H. Fine. Sloan School of Management Sloan School of Management Thesis (Ph.D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, 1999. "June 1999." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 83-84). The first paper presents a model of the supply organization problem in the automotive industry that characterizes both ownership of and access to productive assets. Contracting between a manufacturing firm and a parts supplier is modeled using an incomplete contracting framework that synthesizes those of Grossman-Hart (1986) and Rajan-Zingales (1998). Optimal assignments of ownership and access at key milestones in the product development process are analyzed with respect to their incentive effects on non contractible investment. The merits of this approach are argued using case study evidence from an original five year study of parts contracting in the automotive industry. By incorporating quantifiable measures of design complexity from the product development literature, this model also lends itself to more refined testing of vertical integration behavior in a broad range of industries. The second paper focuses on the coupling of product architecture and sourcing decisions using empirical evidence from the auto industry. The emphasis is on two decisions that a firm must make: whether to manufacture products in-house or to outsource - the make/buy decision, and on product complexity. There has been much research into product architecture and the make/buy decision in the auto industry, yet to the best of the authors' knowledge these decisions have never been studied jointly. The central hypothesis is that increasing complexity in product architecture will drive vertical integration, in that a firm seeking to minimize the coordination costs associated with developing a complex part will internalize production. This proposition is consistent with transaction cost theory regarding asset specificity. Product architectural complexity is proposed as a better proxy for asset specificity than those used previously in empirical testing of transaction costs. Original data is used to test an empirical model of the link between product architectural complexity and make/buy decisions within the context of automobile systems development. Results provide evidence of complementarity between product architectural complexity and vertical integration, as well as evidence of clustering within the auto industry around high performance combinations of the two choice variables. This has implications for optimal incentive structures within firms as well as for interpreting the performance outcomes of firms. by Sharon Novak. Ph.D. 2005-08-19T20:04:40Z 2005-08-19T20:04:40Z 1999 Thesis http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/9773 42810426 eng M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission. http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582 84 leaves 5955564 bytes 5955323 bytes application/pdf application/pdf application/pdf Massachusetts Institute of Technology
spellingShingle Sloan School of Management
Novak, Sharon (Economist)
Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain
title Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain
title_full Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain
title_fullStr Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain
title_full_unstemmed Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain
title_short Sourcing by design : product architecture and the supply chain
title_sort sourcing by design product architecture and the supply chain
topic Sloan School of Management
url http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/9773
work_keys_str_mv AT novaksharoneconomist sourcingbydesignproductarchitectureandthesupplychain
AT novaksharoneconomist productarchitectureandthesupplychain