Assessing the benefits of B2B trade cycle integration: a model in the home appliances industry

摘要

Purpose - The paper aims to give a quantitative assessment of the benefits obtainable by usingrninformation and communication technologies to integrate the order-to-payment process involvingrnmanufacturers and specialized retailers in the home appliances industry.rnDesign/methodology/approach - Standard business processes were defined and activity baserncosting was applied to develop the cost model with the support, i.e. validation and data provision ofrnmost of the companies operating in the Italian home appliances market.rnFindings - The bottom line is €96 per order-to-payment cycle in the conventional, paper-basedrnscenario, compared to €23 in the integrated scenario involving the exchange of structured electronicrndocuments. The potential savings amount to about 80 per cent of the costs, almost equally sharedrnbetween the retailer and the manufacturer. A significant part of the benefits comes from the reductionrnin the management costs of non-conformity issues.rnResearch limitations/implications - The assessment considers only tangible benefits and doesrnnot include more intangible advantages, such as cycle time reduction, compliance with regulation andrneasier and faster accessibility to documents.rnPractical implications - The paper measures the benefits of using trade process integrationrntechnologies and presents a methodology that can be applied to other industries and to particularrnsupply chains. The difficulties in assessing the benefits have been claimed to be one of the mainrnbarriers to adoption.rnOriginality/value - The paper provides a model to assess the order-to-payment cycle costs,rnconsidering both the costs of the "perfect cycle" (where no errors occur) and the cost of managingrnnon-conformities. At present, there is no benchmark available in the literature for the order-to-paymentrncycle costs in conventional and integrated conditions that could help companies to assess the expectedrnbenefits of integration.