Customer-Supplier Relationships: An Empirical Research in the Fiber and Fabric Industries of Chinese Yangtze River Delta

The paper explores the management practices of customer-supplier coordination and integration in Chinese fiber and fabric industries in Yangtze River Delta. Through the adoption of a set of practices supporting coordination or integration in interface processes, a classification of relevant integration techniques (i.e. decisions on how to manage interface processes) and tools (i.e. assets or resources that support the adoption of techniques) is provided. Techniques and tools are grouped into the operations, technological and strategic domains. An in-field research in the fiber and fabric industries provided the ground to measure the diffusion of techniques and tools in the relationships between buyers and suppliers. The study found that at the three domains of operations, technology and strategic planning, the investigated buyer-supplier relationships present some unique features. These features support the industry sales efficiently and effectively nowadays. When the performance is evaluated, the priority of the metrics the industries concern most is also analyzed.