To understand integrated supply chains, it's first important to grasp just what a supply chain is. A supply chain is a collection of suppliers required to create one specific product for a company. Each supplier is a "link" in the chain that adds time and monetary costs. Supply chain management is the collection of methodologies, theories, and practices that go towards keeping a supply chain running and improving its efficiency for the benefit of most, if not all of the links.
Supply chain integration is a large-scale business strategy that brings as many links of the chain as possible into a closer working relationship with each other. The goal is to improve response time, production time, and reduce costs and waste. Every link in the chain benefits. An integration may be done tightly through a merger with another firm in the supply chain, or
loosely through sharing information and working more exclusively with particular suppliers and customers. In the latter case, the supply chain isn’t truly "owned" by one company, but the various links operate almost as if one company to increase efficiency and benefit everyone through steady, reliable business.
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