The fact is that the Internet has increased standards and customers are demanding products or services of higher quality, that are aggressively priced and tailored the way they want them, when they want them. If customers are not satisfied, they will look offshore to source these products. The Internet, having helped nurture these new standards, also provides a means for midsize manufacturers to begin addressing them.

Indeed, the Internet has changed the way midsize manufacturers must do business. They are now being judged on how well they compete within a value chain, rather than how well they perform on their own. A well-designed or manufactured product ultimately may not deliver value to customers because of a bad set of suppliers or an inefficient distribution network. Therefore, midsize manufacturers can no longer prosper in isolation. They need to use technology to improve collaboration with their customers, business partners and suppliers, and they need to take advantage of management techniques and methodologies that will help them compete, given the new realities. This is absolutely critical if they do not want to become the “weak link” in the supply chains they participate in — where demands for agility and mass customization, compressed cycle times and information transparency can only be achieved through improved performance management and collaboration.

Midsize manufacturers can run from these trends, ignore them or embrace them to their individual success or peril.

Learn more about midsize business manufacturing trends and strategies. Click here to qualify to attend Midsize Enterprise Summit as our guest in 2004.

Reference
General Session, Midsize Enterprise Summit
Midsize Business Manufacturing Scenario: Is the Glass Half Full or Half Empty?
Presented: September 11, 2003
Presented by: Bob Anderson, Research Director, Gartner