Abstract

Despite extensive Supply Chain Management (SCM) literature over the last twenty years and the increasing importance of services; the area of Service Supply Chains (SSC) in academia is largely unexplored. This is particularly surprising since the SSC concept is increasingly prevalent in industry (although sometimes alternative terminology such as service chains, after-sales services etc is used). This gap in the academic arena is now being progressively addressed, directly using the SSC concept and terminology in existing “concepts of operations” and service models.

The presentation will provide a summary of the key SSC concepts and research challenges in this area. A case study in the aerospace sector and its preliminary results will formulate part of the presentation. It will address the concepts of service supply chain capabilities, performance metrics, hierarchies with a view towards “end to end” integration.