With the changes in the business environment, there has been an increasing dependence on the skills of companies to deliver customer adapted products quickly and on time around the world. Therefore, instead of being caught in the high cost and unsatisfactory result of managing logistics operation by themselves, many companies have chosen to outsource some or all of their logistics and supply chain activities to specialist third party logistics companies (TPL). Hence, the TPL companies are managing and integrating their customers’ supply chains to increase the competitiveness and profitability. It is argued, that knowledge is becoming the only resource capable of offering competitive advantage and continued growth and prosperity for supply chain partners. Therefore, the effective transfer and creation of knowledge has become a top priority in a supply chain. Since third party logistics companies have taken on the major responsibility of managing customers’ supply chains, effective knowledge management has become a top priority for them as well. The purpose of this thesis is to describe the knowledge transfer and creation processes within the third party logistics dyadic relationships in the context of supply chain integration. The thesis has been carried out by using inductive and conductive research approaches and the qualitative study has been carried out by applying multiple case studies as a research strategy. The empirical material is gathered from four companies in two third party logistics relationships. Data was collected through several interviews conducted at the target companies and the findings have been analysed using the existing theory stated in the frame of reference. The main conclusions from this study are that the buyer-seller context determines the way knowledge is transferred and created in the dyadic third party relationships, and the companies did not have any specific strategies or governance structures for managing knowledge although considered important. How the companies in the dyadic TPL relationships transfer and create knowledge changes with the evolvement of the relationship. Knowledge transfer must penetrate all companies and all organizational levels to increase a holistic and integrated understating of the whole supply chain to achieve value created. How TPL companies create and utilize knowledge internally vary due to company size and the practices used. In addition, the customer company using multiple TPL providers is able to transfer and create knowledge from all TPL relationships to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of its supply chain. Due to the buyer-seller characteristic, however, there are no or very little barriers for knowledge creation and transfer in a dyadic TPL relationship.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hj-11727 |
| Date | January 2010 |
| Creators | Tuuli, Jaakko |
| Publisher | Internationella Handelshögskolan, Högskolan i Jönköping, IHH, Centre of Logistics and Supply Chain Management |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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