Dells integrated supply chain is one of the main reasons for its incredible success due to its

ability to enable rapid product design, fabrication, and assembly alongside their ability to relate
with their customers through direct shipment of custom made products (Blanchard, 2012). In the
technology industry, it is often the case to share suppliers with your competitors. Dell Company
is not special in this context. Together with their suppliers and others in the industry, Dell strives
for high standards and creation of a socially and environmentally responsible ecosystem. As such, they
have adopted the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC) Code of Conduct which sets out
expectations for all industry members and their suppliers. To follow the example set by Dell, and
assuming a car assembly industry as my line of products, suppliers should meet standards such as
conflict free raw materials, there should be non-discrimination and supplier diversity, sustainability
reporting and transparency, supplier engagement, evidence of capability building and assessment
program, continuous improvement, and quarterly business review of suppliers environmental and
social progress (About Dell: Corporate Social Responsibility). On the other hand, suppliers will not be
picked based on cost of individual part they supply but based on the overall cost of the supply chain
including the cost of dealing with a large network o suppliers. The preferred suppliers will have the
ability to provide entire vehicle subsystems and our expertise will be made available to our suppliers to
assist in improving their operations through a range of techniques. In exchange, my company expects
the suppliers to offer yearly price reductions because the sheer quantity of materials my company
anticipates could mean a significant change for a slight variation. Essentially, the vision of the suppliers
must be in line with environmental and social resolutions of the Company.

The secret to a companys success in the technology or automobile market is largely hinged on its
adaptability to customers demands. A direct model employed by Dell-which altered a make to stock
philosophy, to make to order became a poster child of efficiency in the 1990s as production and
destination were demand driven. There was no or less inventory and there generally was a quick flow of
information. Emulating such a model in the automobile industry to begin with, and then shift to a more
inclusive and adaptable method of ordering for vehicles as Dell did from the year 2008 which saw the
company adopt a new and diverse supply chain model to improve its competitiveness to different
customer categories especially at global level who would want to purchase in different ways, apart from
online. Distribution thus will become an important cog in the overall profitability of the business in that
it will impact both the supply chain cost and most importantly the customers experience (Chopra, 2002).

In so doing, it will be possible to offer cost savings due to elimination of levies incurred through
middlemen and it will also enable generation of a market data that could be used to forecast demand
trends and also to carry out effective segmentation. Ordering should be done through the internet or via
a phone call in this model.