Tingting Yan to be published in Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management
Associate Professor Tingting Yan had an article accepted for publication in the Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management. The article, titled “Theory of Supplier Network-Based Innovation Value,” was coauthored by Sophie Yang and Kevin Dooley.
The Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management publishes original, high-quality research that has a significant impact on purchasing and supply chain management theory and practice. It covers all subjects relating to the purchase and supply of goods and services in industry, commerce, local, national, and regional government, health and transportation.
Abstract
To understand how a supplier helps a buying company create value through innovations, studies have focused on a supplier's internal resources or its relationship with a buying company. Building upon this body of literature, we develop a theory of supplier network-based innovation value in this conceptual paper. This theory explains how a supplier's upstream and downstream value network can be a source of competitive advantage for a buying company. Specifically, it proposes that the levels and types of supplier innovation value is contingent on the configuration of a dual-ego value network, characterized by the locus and degree of buyer-supplier structural equivalence. This theory also explains how a supplier's ties with a buying firm's competitors can pose both opportunity and risk to buying company innovation. This theory contributes to the literature by showing when “seemingly undesirable” suppliers, due to a lack of technical capability or strong relationship with a buying company, might still be valuable to a buying company's innovation.
