How sourcing knowledge is acquired in companies

As companies increasingly have more horizontal specialization in their business structures, the number of items procured and amounts of money spent have been increasing, resulting in a larger impact by the procurement on corporate earnings. In the electronics industry, more and more companies are moving to the horizontal specialization structure. Among them, Apple which outsources not only its parts but also the production of its apparatus appears to be making skillful use of sourcing, to the point that its sourcing capability has been serving as one of the main drivers of its high performance. Apple is known to employ people from the same industry it purchases parts from to acquire their highly sophisticated knowledge. On the other hand, there are companies such as Japanese car manufacturers that accumulate sourcing knowledge internally. Surveys using questionnaires and interviews were conducted and analysis was made on how the Japanese manufacturing companies are acquiring knowledge necessary to perform effective sourcing activity. As a result, it was found that the acquisition method of procurement knowledge differs depending on the product architecture type. Building on this finding, a method for enhancing organizational knowledge to improve procurement work is proposed.