MODERN WAREHOUSE MANAGEMENT IN THE MANUFACTURING AND SERVICE INDUSTRY - A CASE STUDY OF THE TURKISH AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY

Abstract

In automotive industry, warehousing has a great importance as a part of supply chain. In today‟s competitive automotive market, companies are under pressure by market forces to improve their warehousing capabilities if they are to compete in the market place. The rising modifications in vehicles models, types and designs across different segments with increase in the differentiation of spare parts has also made the SCM more complex in a lean environment of the auto industry.

This has also forced many companies to customize their value stream mapping and value chain analysis to increase their customer service levels, which has led to the changes in the role of WMSs. In this thesis it is also explained the framework and functionality of WMS in productiveness of the industry in times of economic melt-down and expansion in products. The thesis, measures the impacts of improved WMS in Turkish automotive industry supply chain against the 14 automotive manufacturers operating as OEMs and ACMs in Turkey with emphasis on production capacity, annual sales and market share of each company as reported in the annual company report presented to shareholders.