Logistics in Estonian Business Companies

Abstract

Abstract. The article describes logistics survey in Estonia carried out in 2007 as a part of the LogOnBaltic project. The level of logistics in Estonian manufacturing, trading and logistics companies is explored through logistics costs, performance indicators, outsourcing, ICT use and logistics self-estimation of the companies responded. Responses from 186 Estonian companies were gathered through a web-based survey (38% of manufacturing, 38% of trading and 24% of logistics sector). Logistics costs as the percentage of turnover make in average 13.8% in manufacturing and 13.3% in trading. Transportation and inventory carrying cost form around 70% of overall logistics costs. Considering the logistics indicators surveyed, Estonian companies show up with relatively low perfect order fulfillment rates, short customer order fulfillment cycles and effective management of cash flows. The most widely outsourced logistics function is international transportation followed by domestic transportation, freight forwarding and reverse logistics. By 2010, the outsourcing of IT systems in logistics followed by inventory management, warehousing and product customization is expected to increase more substantially. The awareness of logistics importance is still low among Estonian companies. Only 27-44% of those agree that logistics has a considerable impact on profitability, competitive advantage, top management or customer service level.

Evaluation of Logistics Centres Establishment: External and Internal Factors

“…In the process of creation the conceptual model of evaluation of Logistics centres establishment the following scientific and practical assumptions were identified (Ye, Tiong 2000;Išoraitė 2005Išoraitė , 2006Raudeliūnienė 2007;Raudeliūnienė, Zinkevičiūtė 2007;Chlivickas, Raudeliūnienė 2007Kiisler 2008;Davidavičienė (Elskytė), Raudeliūnienė 2008;Bivainis, Tunčikienė 2009;Snieška et al 2009;Ginevičius 2008;Ginevičius et al 2010;Navickas, Malakauskaitė 2010): the analysis of the process of the formation of compe--titive strategic decisions has revealed that the major parts of this process are strategic analysis and the stages of strategy creation; the analysis of the process of strategic analysis revealed -that the major parts of this process are evaluation of external and internal factors of competition, SWOT analysis;…”

Transport Management: The Popularity of Study Programmes Among the Applicants to Lithuanian Universities Evaluating the Qualifications of Graduates in the Labour‐market

“…Gromule and Yatskiv (2007) analysed a coach terminal as the key element of transport infrastructure. Th e problems of logistics centers and companies were studied by Kiisler (2008), Kabashkin (2007), Tolli and Laving (2007), Meidutė (2007) and Jaržemskis (2007). Ziari et al (2007) examined the problems of locating the stations of public transportation vehicles for improving transit accessibility.…”

Agile Service Oriented Shipping Companies in the Container Terminal

“…Apart from agile service, an advanced management ideology and manufacturing philosophy, a lot of changes have happened not only in manufacturing industry but also in the whole supply chain. Under this circumstance, ports have become an isolated point in the transport chain and are confronted with increasing pressure from the market (Baublys 2009;Paulauskas 2009;Barysienė 2008a and2008b;Kiisler 2008;Paulauskas and Bentzen 2008;Burkovskis 2008;Afandizadeh and Moayedfar2008;Lingaitienė 2008;Miao and Xi 2008;Kabashkin 2007;Tolli and Laving 2007;Rohács and Simongáti 2007;Meirane 2007;Jaržemskis and Vasilis Vasiliauskas 2007 etc. ).…”