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The purpose of this study is to map current knowledge on big data analytics (BDA) for supply chain risk management (SCRM) while providing future research needs.

The research team systematically reviewed 53 articles published between 2015 and 2021 and further contrasted the synthesis of these articles with four in-depth interviews with BDA startups that provider solutions for SCRM.

The analysis is framed in three perspectives. First, supply chain visibility – i.e. the number of tiers in the solutions; second, BDA analytical approach – descriptive, prescriptive or predictive approaches; third, the SCRM processes from risk monitoring to risk optimization. The study underlines that the forefront of innovation lies in multi-tiered, multi-directional solutions based on prescriptive BDA to support risk response and optimization (SCRM). In addition, we show that research on these innovations is scant, thus offering an important avenue for future studies.

This study makes relevant contributions to the field. We offer a theoretical framework that highlights the key relationships between supply chain visibility, BDA approaches and SCRM processes. Despite being at forefront of the innovation frontier, startups are still an under-explored agent. In times of major disruptions such as COVID-19 and the emergence of a plethora of new technologies that reshape businesses dynamically, future studies should map the key role of such actors to the advancement of SCRM.

The purpose of this paper is to scrutinise how the sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) literature has discussed knowledge dynamics across the extended supply network, particularly in the contemporary context of fragmented, globally dispersed supply networks.

A systematic approach to reviewing the literature is applied, covering 20 years, starting with 267 references, and narrowing down to 88 articles specifically addressing knowledge diffusion processes across the extended supply network.

This study shows that vertical ties limited to direct suppliers or third-party monitoring of global suppliers are both insufficient. Lack of co-opetition is an impediment to knowledge diffusion. And the debate of whether or not global dispersion is an impediment to knowledge diffusion seems inconclusive. More importantly, there is a lack of network-level studies mapping the diversity of actors in supply networks.

First, future SSCM research should shift from an operational focus to strategic knowledge diffusion. Second, the scope of SSCM should expand from linear buyer–supplier relationships to multi-tier and multilateral studies. Special focus should be placed on the literature on social network to support processes that look at the drivers of effective large-scale, global diffusion of sustainability.

This review contends that it is paramount to set a new research direction captured in a new definition of “sustainable supply network management”. Future research should overcome the barriers of data collection at the network level in order to contribute to the field’s current challenges, which clearly lies in globally dispersed and complex supply network, not dyads or linear chains.

Fashion brands are under heavy criticism for often exhibiting poor working conditions and producing environmental damage. Pressure comes from initiatives such as Fashion Transparency Index (FTI) by Fashion Revolution to assess fashion brands' transparency based on information publicly disclosed. But an understanding of how such movements reflect in a Global South country characterised by institutional voids is still absent.

While the FTI ranks individual brands, in this study the authors have analysed 305 documents extracted from the websites of 20 Brazilian fashion brands to unpack practices and re-bundle them according to three archetypes – opaque, translucent and transparent – that display a maturity curve.

The authors show that advancement is heterogeneous, and we complement previous research exposing the limits of an NGO in driving transparency by investigating a context embedded in institutional voids. The authors show that most fashion brands restrict transparency to tier-1 suppliers. Moreover, although fashion brands increasingly demand disclosure from their suppliers, they do not clarify their own purchasing practices such as cancellation and payment policies. On the positive note, the authors show that maturity for transparent brands can include the actionability concept by engaging with consumer via surveys and educative content.

The authors contribute to theory by offering a maturity curve of fashion supply chain transparency. The authors contribute to practice by offering the three archetypes – opaque, translucent and transparent. This study unveils heterogeneity and asymmetry between the levels of transparency that buying firms demand from their suppliers against what they provide about their own practices.

Despite the systemic nature of circular economy (CE), theorisation that draws from a supply network perspective is only incipient. Moreover, the operations and supply chain management (OSCM) field has engaged in little dialogue with circularity. This study explores social network analysis (SNA) to depict how the shift from linear to circular not only leads to higher rates of resource economy, repair and recycle but also reshapes governance dynamics and network structure of supply networks.

The study departs from a systematic review of the literature and draws from core concepts in OSCM, CE and SNA to offer theoretical propositions that articulate how social network metrics can depict supply network circularity. The framework is illustrated with examples from fashion and electronics industries.

Four theoretical propositions enlighten how betweenness centrality, eigenvector centrality and network density can explain the shift from linear to circular supply networks across the three CE strategies of narrowing, slowing and closing.

The combination of biomimicry, CE, the push–pull dichotomy and social network metrics offer a theory-driven framework for supply network circularity.

This study analyzes whether power in the supply chain, based on governance modes and network centrality, explain financial performance at different levels of analysis: buyers, suppliers and dyads.

The study employs a dual macro-micro lens based on global value chain (i.e. market, modular, relational and captive governance modes) and social network analysis (network centrality) to assess the impact of power (im)balance onto financial performance. Different from previous research, this study adopts information reliability techniques – such as information entropy – to differentiate the weights of distinct financial performance metrics in terms of the maximal entropy principle. This principle states that the probability distribution that best represents the current state of knowledge given prior data is the one with largest entropy. These weights are used in TOPSIS analysis.

Results offer insightful reflections to SCM research. We show that buyers outperform suppliers due to power asymmetry. We ground our findings both analyzing across governance modes and comparing network centrality. We show that market and modular governances (where power balance prevails) outperform relational and captive modes at the dyadic level – thus inferring that in the long run these governance modes may lead to financially healthier supply chains.

This study advances SCM research by exploring the impact of governance modes and network centrality on performance at both firm and dyadic levels while employing an innovative combination of secondary data and robust set of techniques including TOPSIS, WASPAS and information entropy.

In recent years, “servitization” has been studied extensively; however, as studies of the impact of servitization on firm performance offer mixed results, the conditions under which the relationship between servitization and performance becomes more significant are contested in the literature. These mixed results have led to the term “service paradox.” The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This study investigates servitization in the assembly industry based on a multi-country survey covering 539 industry plants in 22 countries.

The study contributes to the research on servitization by adding a contextual perspective to this relationship, taking into account level of development of the country in which a firm is located. Besides confirming the correlation between the servitization and performance, our study unveils a counter-intuitive result: a medium level of development of the country in which a firm is based corresponds to a stronger relationship between servitization and firm performance, whereas higher levels of development seem to diminish the increase in performance.

This study balances out the focus in servitization on advanced economies and help to unveil its benefits in developing countries. Fostering servitization in developing economies can lead to social impact resulting from job shifts from manufacturing to service and the correlated implications for workers’ training and higher motivation experienced in service-based jobs.

Our study unpacks the “service paradox” and indicates that industry plants in developing countries can still harness the benefits of being first-movers, whereas, in developed countries, servitization may have become an order qualifier rather than a factor of differentiation.

In acknowledging the reality of climate change, large firms have set internal and external (supplier oriented) targets to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. This study aims to explore the complex processes behind the evolution and diffusion of carbon reduction strategies in supply networks.

The research uses complex adaptive systems (CASs) as a theoretical framework and presents a single case study of a focal buying firm and its supply network in the food sector. A longitudinal and multilevel analysis is used to discuss the dynamics between the focal firm, the supply network and external environment.

Rather than being a linear and controlled process of adoption implementation outcomes, the transition to reduce carbon in a supply network is much more dynamic, emerging as a result of a number of factors at the individual, organisational, supply network and environmental levels.

The research considers the emergence of a carbon reduction strategy in the food sector, driven by a dominant buying firm. Future research should seek to investigate the diffusion of environmental strategies more broadly and in other contexts.

Findings from the research reveal the limits of the control that a buying firm can exert over behaviours in its network and show the positive influence of consortia initiatives on transitioning to sustainability in supply networks.

CAS is a fairly novel theoretical lens for researching environmental supply network dynamics. The paper offers fresh multilevel insights into the emergent and systemic nature of the diffusion of environmental practices in supply networks.

This case study shows how Osklen, a 30-year-old fashion brand in Brazil that focuses on Brazilianness and sustainability, has been facing challenges in the last 10 years pioneering the adoption of recycled cotton in its products. By taking the lens of biomimicry and supply networks that encompass vertical, horizontal, and diagonal ties, the case exposes how the weak links in the transition to circular fashion limit advancements. In a field such as sustainability where lack of transparency prevails and there is decoupling between practices and communication, consumers are often unaware of what is being done behind the scenes, and pioneer fashion brands may not benefit from sustainable and circular fashions. Besides the challenges at the consumer front, the shift to circular fashion is hindered by having scavengers as the weak link in the supply network given the lack of financial incentives, excessive informality, and misguided marketing from larger brands.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the innovation strategies of the sugar–energy industry in Central-Southern Brazil with regard to its resource structure and results.

The data were collected through a questionnaire covering the three-year period from 2015 through 2017. The results were extracted based on a combination of factor analysis and multiple regression analysis.

The innovation strategies of Brazilian sugar–energy companies are characterized as defensive and imitative based on the resources dedicated to innovation and the implementation of innovation with respect to products, processes, eco-innovation and cost reductions.

The sample is representative, but it does not cover all companies in the Brazilian sugar–energy industry. The data were acquired using a survey, and the results could not be compared to the financial results of the companies.

Sugar–energy companies need to define their innovation strategies, as these strategies lead to different results that can be achieved only through the management of resources dedicated to the generation and implementation of innovations. Managers and analysts need to know the profile of these innovation strategies to evaluate the effectiveness of the results based on the resources that were invested.

This study presents an exploratory model that identified two factors related to innovation efforts and three results. It is possible to define the innovation strategies of companies in the Brazilian sugar–energy industry, which is one of the most competitive in Brazil.