Discuss the impact of the product life cycle on strategic fit between implied demand uncertainty and supply chain responsiveness
What will be an ideal response?
Answer: As products go through their life cycle, the demand characteristics and the needs of the customer segments being served change. Supply characteristics also change as the product and production technologies mature. High-tech products are particularly prone to these life cycle swings over a very compressed time span. A product goes through life cycle phases from the introductory phase, when only the leading edge of customers is interested in it and supply is uncertain, all the way to the point at which the product becomes a commodity, the market is saturated, and supply is predictable. Thus, if a company is to maintain strategic fit, its supply chain strategy must evolve as its products enter different phases. As products mature, the corresponding supply chain strategy should, in general, move from being responsive to being efficient. The key point here is that demand and supply characteristics change over a product's life cycle. Because demand and supply characteristics change, the supply chain strategy must also change over the product life cycle if a company is to continue achieving strategic fit.
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A company can stretch its product line either upward or downward, but not both directions
Indicate whether the statement is true or false
Toward the end of the fiscal year, the owner of a small company came back from lunch concerned because he had learned that a business targeting the same customers as his was planning on spending $150,000 on promotion
As soon as he arrived at the office, he called his financial manager and said, "I want to budget $150,000 for next year's promotion." Which method of promotional budgeting did the owner want to use? A) the objective-task method B) the percentage-of-sales method C) the competitive-parity method D) the bottom-up method E) the pull-push method