The Supplier’s Role in New Product strongDevelopmentstrong Initiatives An.pdfVIP

The Supplier’s Role in New Product Development Initiatives: An Assessment of Research Efforts Lance Gentry, Ph.D., Missouri University of Science Technology, USA Katrina Savitskie, Ph.D., University of Memphis, USA ABSTRACT The authors review the literature on the impact suppliers may have on the new product development (NPD) process to show the benefits of integrating suppliers within a firm’s NPD design team. In the tables, the authors have categorized the research studies examined, as either case based or empirical and reference some key findings to help future researchers in their efforts to examine earl y supplier involvement in new product development a ctivities. INTRODUCTION Today’s competitive world requires firms to work diligently to build relationships to help the firm succeed. Additionally customers expect new products even more quickly than before and in this environment a manufacturing company must explore all available opportunities. If a firm’s suppliers can be encouraged to take a more active role in the design of new products, then the manufacturer can use the supplier’s expertise early in the design stage of the product to shorten the time-to-market for new products. Moreover, markets are becoming more fragmented which further necessitates working with suppliers to respond to these market challenges. Unfortunately, manufacturers may understand “why” they should form supplier collaborations but probably not “how” to effectively integrate suppliers into the product development effort (Handfield et al., 1999; Monczka et al., 2000).