SUPPLY CHAIN PARTNERSHIPS - OPPORTUNITIES FOR OPERATIONS-RESEARCH

A maturing stream of recent conceptual literature has focused upon sup ply chain partnerships. Theoretically within a supply chain partnershi p, traditional competitive barriers between supply chain members are m itigated to create mutually beneficial relationships, thus leading to increased information flows, reduced uncertainty, and a more profitabl e supply chain. Despite extensive conceptual based supply chain litera ture, very few researchers have attempted a more rigorous analytical a pproach to supply chain issues. This paper seeks to provide a review o f supply chain research from both the qualitative conceptual and analy tical operations research perspectives. The expanding importance of su pply chain integration presents a challenge to operations researchers to focus more attention on supply chain modeling, and there are numero us opportunities for operations researchers to provide support for the current conceptual based supply chain research. (C) 1997 Elsevier Sci ence B.V.