Evaluating the impacts of COVID-19 outbreak on supply chain risks by modified failure mode and effects analysis: a case study in an automotive company

Abstract

Supply chains have been facing many disruptions due to natural and man-made disasters. Recently, the global pandemic caused by COVID-19 outbreak, has severely hit trade and investment worldwide. Companies around the world faced significant disruption in their supply chains. This study aims to explore the impacts of COVID-19 outbreak on supply chain risks (SCRs). Based on a comprehensive literature review on supply chain risk management, 70 risks are identified and listed in 7 categories including demand, supply, logistics, political, manufacturing, financial and information. Then, a modified failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA) is proposed to assess the identified SCRs, which integrates FMEA and best–worst method to provide a double effectiveness. The results demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method, and according to the main findings, “insufficient information about demand quantities”, “shortages on supply markets”, “bullwhip effect”, “loss of key suppliers”, “transportation breakdowns”, “suppliers”, “on-time delivery”, “government restrictions”, “suppliers’ temporary closure”, “market demand change” and “single supply sourcing” are the top 10 SCRs during the COVID-19 outbreak, respectively. Finally, the practical implications are discussed and useful managerial insights are recommended.

How did COVID-19 affect logistics and supply chain processes? Immediate, short and medium-term evidence from some industrial fields of Italy

“…Focusing instead on the MEM industry, the available literature has provided some evidence on the automotive industry ( Tamtam and Tourabi, 2021 ; Ghadir et al, 2022 ), which is a very specific segment of this sector; hence, results of these previous studies are not always suitable for a direct comparison with the present paper. Having said that, it is first to be observed that the drop in the volumes handled for the MEM industry appears as less relevant compared to T&F. Similar considerations hold true for the service level delivered to customers: MEM companies suffered from poor service performance mainly at the very beginning of the pandemic period, corresponding to the lockdown of many countries, but the pre-Covid conditions were easily restored.…”

“…Two case studies in the fashion footwear context have been analyzed by Braglia et al (2022) , with the aim to investigate how companies in this field reacted to the disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, so as to increase resilience in case of future disruptions. The papers by Tamtam and Tourabi (2021) and Ghadir et al (2022) have instead analyzed the effects of Covid-19 in the automotive industry. The former authors have focused on the agile capability of automotive companies in the pandemic period, while the latter authors have proposed an approach for prioritizing risks induced by Covid-19 in the automotive supply chain.…”

Analyzing the key performance indicators of circular supply chains by hybrid fuzzy cognitive mapping and Fuzzy DEMATEL: evidence from healthcare sector

“…There has been high attention among researchers for performance management in the healthcare sector (Jiang et al, 2020 ). The increased competitive pressure of COVID-19 has forced hospitals to revise their evaluating management system (Ghadir et al, 2022 ; Lotfi, Kargar, Gharehbaghi, et al, 2021a ). There are several important issues for the hospital circular supply chain such as supply chain inefficiencies, redundant administrative costs, and unsuitable care, waste.…”

Listening to experts is not always wise: Unravelling the dynamics of decision‐making in the crisis cell

“…Crisis management has become a key aspect of all organizations in recent years, particularly for multinational companies such as the one presented in this article. After worldwide cyberattacks such as Wannacry and Not Petya (Backman, 2021), worldwide terrorist threats (Ruggiero & Vos, 2015), the COVID‐19 global pandemic (Capano et al, 2020), and the Suez Canal disaster (Ramos et al, 2021), all organizations recognize that they are at risk of suffering the consequences of crises and must therefore be prepared, including companies (Branquinho, 2018; Dau et al, 2018; Ghadir et al, 2022; Li, 2022; Özkanlisoy & Akkartal, 2021; Rababah et al, 2020; Richardson et al, 2009; Watson et al, 2017). The first stage of such preparation is to set up a dedicated and organized group or cell within the organization that is responsible for managing and responding to crises or emergencies, called a crisis cell.…”