Position Paper on Intelligent Supply Chains: An Information Management Perspective

This paper is intended to present and to analyze the concept of the Intelligent Supply Chain (ISC). The purpose of the paper is to: 1) Clarify the concept of the intelligent supply chain; 2) Identify emerging research opportunities; and 3) Specify a research engagement model for further exploration of the concept.

The ideas and notions integrated and presented in this paper have evolved over a period of one or two years and have partly been presented in other papers. This paper is a mash up from different sources and it is intended for communicating the ideas. Thus the aim in this paper is to frame the concept of Intelligent Supply Chain and to establish an overall perspective based on information management.

The claim made here is that the notion of the intelligent enterprise contributes with a new perspective on supply chain management that addresses the current challenges in an industrial supply chain. The argument is further that the existing information systems embodied in the standard enterprise information systems (EIS) have an important role in driving the development of modern supply chains though business processes. This is warranted by an analysis of the role of EIS on the development of intelligent supply chains. It is concluded that information management is critical to intelligent supply chains and a research agenda is outlined.