PortEconomics co-director Theo Notteboom along with Lu Chen of ITMMA – University of Antwerp in Belgium jointly published a study in the academic journal International Journal of Logistics Systems and Management on “Cost perspective on the location of value-added logistics services in supply chains”.
The study discusses the location of VALS and its impact on supply chain configurations and logistics costs. In particular, the research focuses on: 1) the importance of VALS in cost terms to the supply chain; 2) the impact of location decisions regarding VALS on the supply chain, taking into account logistics time costs and out-of-pocket costs; 3) the role of the logistics characteristics of products and the nature of VALS in the location decisions regarding VALS.
The study presents an evaluation model for optimising the location of VALS which is empirically applied to the cost flow associated with a container filled with sportswear shoes and is relevant to seaports as many ports are vying to attract logistics activities (see e.g. port-centric logistics) and understanding the required locational qualities for VALS can help ports to target the right activities.
You may freely download authors’ version @PortEconomics.eu.
