Supply Chain Innovation is a Key to Superior Firm Performance an Insight from Indian Cement Manufacturing

The following statistical study shows the results of an investigation of supply chain innovation practices of Indian Cement Manufacturers, which are a significantly large and quickly advancing industry in India. Aside from being a study of adoption of supply chain innovation practices (SCIP) in an emerging super power (India) the benefits of supply chain innovation (SCI) are discussed including the major advances in supply chain management. The statistical study compared innovation supply chain practices (like JIT, WMS, CPFR, and others) in 125 large cement firms to their financial performance measures (ROI, market share, EBIDTA, customer satisfaction, productivity). The resulting correlations showed very high levels of reliability and adequacy, and were uses to make conclusions on which supply chain innovation practices had a positive impact on company financial performance. The conclusions are somewhat astounding with the interesting finding that some innovation practices do not support firm performance and maybe should be avoided; while others ICS practices are shown to support firm performance to a high degree.