SMEs in supply chain: a supplier evaluation model and some empirical results

The paper aims at providing a Vendor Assessment model which can be useful to evaluate potentialities and capabilities of suppliers. The assessment of a supplier’s capacity to undertake supply relations is carried out by means of a process-based view of the company. It is assumed that effective and integrated processes contribute to a company’s capacity to develop satisfactory relations within the supply chain in which it operates. The assessment of each process is based on the measurement of its assets or variables of state: human, technology and finance resources and organisational skills. The analysis has been carried on by a survey to verifying the potential of southern Italian sub-contractors to respond to the needs of commissioning companies in the machine tools and special purpose machines industries. The ultimate aim of the study, which is funded by the European Union and the Institute for Industrial Promotion, is to create new client-supplier relations between large companies in the machines sector and small and medium enterprise (SME) suppliers in southern Italy. Although the study has not yet reached an acceptable level of statistical significance, the in-depth analysis of approximately 200 suppliers in the machine sector does, nevertheless, indicate the strengths and weaknesses of sub-contraction in southern Italy, and suggests possible ways in which those companies still without sufficient skills to satisfy the needs of potential commissioners can improve.