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There are three aims of this research. One is to verify the mutual effects between internal collaboration and external collaboration, another is to prove performance improvement among different levels of supply chain collaboration, and the third is to analyze gaps between the two viewpoints. The population is Korean FDI firms in China and 208 data are used in the analysis. The data are treated with various methods: exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, SEM, cluster analysis, ANOVA, MANOVA and post hoc analysis. The results are as follows. First, external collaboration and internal collaboration have positive effects on each other, which have a positive effect on performance. This means that efficiency of internal processes is the cause of promoting connection with external processes and information generated from the market is the basis of a variance of internal processes, followed by high performance. Second, service performance improvement is more definite than cost performance improvement among different levels of supply chain collaboration. Firms can achieve more definite results in service performance when they perform supply chain collaboration. Third, this research verifies both the viewpoint of directions of supply chain collaboration and the strategic choice viewpoint of supply chain collaboration to better understand supply chain collaboration. Both viewpoints approach supply chain collaboration from different viewpoints but they do explain the methods for performance improvement.

Successful implementation of supply chain collaboration (SCC) by Wal‐Mart has encouraged many manufacturing companies, such as Procter & Gamble, Hewlett‐Packard Co, and West Marine Products Inc., to initiate collaboration. Subsequently, collaboration between suppliers and retailers has become a common practice in many recent supply chains. However, measuring the benefits of collaboration is still a big challenge. Based on supply chain literature and practice, this paper aims to propose a conceptual framework and a standard set of metrics to evaluate the performance of SCC.

The authors discuss two case studies to validate the proposed model. The case study discussions are appropriate to understand the usage of different performance metrics in initial and advanced stages of collaboration.

From the case study it is recognized that the collaborating members in the supply chain are not able to visualise all possible benefits of collaboration. To surmount this issue, the paper proposes a framework to study the performance of companies involved in initial and advanced stages of collaboration.

The classification suggested in this paper on different stages of collaboration and related metrics can guide researchers and practitioners in manufacturing companies to evaluate the performance of SCC.

Collaboration is an important emerging dimension of sustainable supply chain management. How to improve supply chain collaboration (SCC) by means of operational excellence approaches has become an important research topic. The Internet of things (IoT), an important means of operational excellence, has also received increased attention. For better collaboration by the IoT, this study proposes a novel methodology to evaluate the measures of IoT adoption in SCC.

Based on the six-domain model and the common classification of collaboration, the measures of the IoT and the criteria of SCC are developed, respectively. A hybrid multi-step methodology that combines neutrosophic set theory, analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and technology for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution (TOPSIS) is proposed to complete the evaluation.

The results show that improving information transparency, strengthening the integration of management information systems and improving large data processing abilities are the most important measures of the IoT in improving SCC. Measures such as introducing sensing technology and laser scanning technology rank at the bottom and are relatively unimportant.

The research results provide insights and references for firms to improve SCC by adopting appropriate IoT measures.

Most of existing studies indicate the significance of technology in SCC. But this study shows a different conclusion that technologies rank the bottom, while information transparency is more important. And a suitable explanation is given. It further enriches the theoretical studies in SCC field.

Building supply chain resilience is increasingly recognized as an effective strategy to deal with supply chain challenges, risks and disruptions. Nevertheless, it remains unclear how to build supply chain resilience and whether supply chain resilience could achieve a competitive advantage.

By analyzing the data collected from 216 firms in China, the current study empirically examines how information technology (IT) capability and supply chain collaboration affect different forms of supply chain resilience (external resilience and internal resilience) and examines the performance implications of these two forms of supply chain resilience.

Results show that IT capability is positively related to external resilience, whereas supply chain collaboration is positively related to internal resilience. The combination of IT capability and supply chain collaboration is positively related to external resilience. In addition, internal resilience is positively related to firm performance.

This study used only cross-sectional data from China for hypothesis testing. Future studies could utilise longitudinal data and research other countries/regions.

The findings systematically assess how IT capability and supply chain collaboration contribute to supply chain resilience and firm performance. The results provide a benchmark of supply chain resilience improvement that can be expected from IT capability and supply chain collaboration.

The study findings advance the understanding of supply chain resilience and provide practical implications for supply chain managers.

This paper aims to investigate the gap between the interests in supply chain collaboration (SCC) and the relatively few recorded cases of successful applications – this is the reality of SCC.

The research represents the viewpoints of the authors based on their collective field experiences and literature reviews.

Three realities of SCC are identified – establishing the prerequisites for the collaboration process; where the process starts; and where it terminates. Moreover, a realistic structured approach to SCC containing three loops is outlined.

Increased awareness for practitioners in SCM by crystallizing when collaboration is useful; what to change; what to change to; and how to make changes happen.

The value of the paper is that it offers a “different” perspective on SCC.

Although supply chain collaboration (SCC) theoretically boosts the adoption of supply chain finance (SCF) through information sharing and cost savings, many companies with good supply chain partnerships still hesitate to engage in SCF. To disentangle this puzzle, this study aims to explore how two dimensions of information transparency (i.e. information quantity and information quality) and two types of transaction dependence (i.e. dependence on suppliers and dependence on customers) influence the relationship between SCC and SCF adoption.

This study uses secondary survey data from a Chinese bank, including 464 Chinese companies that have adopted SCF to varying degrees. This study then performs the logistic regression analysis to test the hypotheses.

This study empirically confirms that SCC shows a positive relationship with SCF adoption. More interestingly, information quantity negatively moderates this positive relationship, whereas information quality positively moderates this positive relationship. Most surprisingly, dependence on customers rather than dependence on suppliers strengthens this positive relationship.

This study makes theoretical contributions to the SCF literature by demonstrating the distinct moderating mechanisms regarding the relationship between SCC and SCF adoption. The findings also help companies reexamine their interactions with supply chain members.

The high level of competition in the globalized business environment forces companies to innovate to remain competitive. Previous literature often cites information technology (IT) and supply chain collaboration as direct contributors to product innovation and IT as a direct enabler of supply chain collaboration. This suggests that IT could have an indirect effect on product innovation through supply chain collaboration, although this relationship has not been addressed yet. This paper aims to analyze empirically the direct impacts of IT and supply chain collaboration on incremental and radical product innovation and the indirect effect of IT on both types of product innovation through supply chain collaboration by using data collected from a sample of 200 manufacturing firms.

Structural equation modeling was used to check the research hypotheses with a sample of 200 manufacturing companies.

The results show supply chain collaboration has a positive effect on technological innovation, showing that the collaboration with external agents foster both incremental and radical innovations. Furthermore, results show that IT directly enhances both types of product innovation (incremental and radical) indirectly through supply chain collaboration.

This article supports the pursuit of open innovation that suggests the need to acquire external knowledge to be able to develop innovation projects. The use of tools that facilitate this transmission of knowledge becomes indispensable in environments in which companies must be involved in supply chains in which different external agents intervene and in which collaboration can promote the creation of synergies and superior competitive advantages.

Innovation requires more and more the use of knowledge management practices that capture external information to be used in the creation of new products. In this case, collaboration within a supply chain facilitates incremental and radical innovations. However, to strengthen this transfer of information and the adoption of behaviors that stimulate innovation, the company must use ITs.

This paper focus on the indirect effect of IT on product innovation through the creation of the collaborations with external agents. In spite of the importance of this relation, it has been poorly studied by previous literature. The paper’s greatest interest lies in the fact that ITs not only facilitate the transmission of knowledge but also facilitate other types of behavior among supply chain agents that invite collaboration and generate innovations.

Considering the limitations of supply chain collaboration (SCC) literature, the purpose of this paper is to develop SCC framework and analyze the SCC practice based on the framework. The framework incorporating internal and external knowledge sharing under a collaborative culture (CC) and problem-solving environment preceded by preparedness is required.

To achieve successful collaboration, this paper encompasses problem-solving and performance measurement, preparedness, culture, relationship strength (RS) and gives resource sharing and planning as internal and external focused perspectives. Exploratory methods are used to analyze the data from industries.

CC, RS and preparedness are crucial that reflect the health of collaboration. Three levels of collaboration practice – good, moderate and weak – are prominent where the extent of SCC practice seems weak. Collaborative activities that matter more are identified. Market-based knowledge sharing is important for good and moderate SCC, while weaker collaboration does not focus on it. Interestingly, this paper finds an increasing level of collaboration may not always result in increased performance. Firms from the pharmaceutical, automobile and electrical/electronic industry tended to practice higher collaboration as compared to other industries.

By integrating market-driven management, resource-based view, and contingency theory, the SCC framework gives a new perspective. Joint planning and resource sharing are categorized as internal and external focused functional areas. The paper identifies three profiles of collaboration and discusses the importance of SCC activities in achieving performance.

Supply chain collaboration (SCC) benefits organizational performance (OP). Although it is complex, it is also hard to implement and measure collaborative initiatives in the field of the supply chain. This study aims to examine the role of information technology (IT) and people’s involvement in OP through the mediation of supply chain collaboration.

This study used a deductive and quantitative approach to test the research hypotheses. Data was collected from 249 supply chain professionals working at various manufacturing firms.

This research found a significant effect of IT on supply chain collaboration. Similarly, people involvement (PI) also significantly influenced the supply chain collaboration. For the mediation hypotheses, SCC significantly mediates the relationships between two independent variables (IT and PI) and OP. Furthermore, the full mediation of SCC occurred.

This study provides a framework emphasizing manufacturing firms’ practices, SCC and OP. The “people involvement” was found as a novel variable in the tested model using the resource-based view as a supporting theory. The research findings can benefit the professionals working on supply chain business processes to improve OP.

It is important to understand the factors that are significant in supply chain (SC) collaboration decision making and whether supply chain collaborative factors that are considered in the literature are still valid. To date, SC collaboration has not been extensively studied in the literature with supply chain finance (SCF) factors to evaluate SCF performance. Therefore, in this paper, the authors investigate the interrelationships between SCF and supply chain collaborative (SCC) factors for achieving SCF performance. The authors identified the most important factors from the literature on SCF and SCC and with inputs from experts in the textile industry in Pakistan.

The authors employed the Gray-Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory approach to help examine the cause-and-effect relationship between the factors and identify the influence of each factor on the others.

The findings showed that the most prominent factors of the study are “level of digitalization”, “information sharing”, and “collaborative communication”, and “most effect factors of this study are incentive alignment” and “information quality”. Furthermore, the “Level of digitalization” was identified as the factor with the central role and most significant correlation with other factors.

The major implication of the study is that textile industries should effectively develop their supply chain decisions after analyzing their internal and external factors, which will help in developing strategies that will facilitate better management of SCF relationships. The limitations of the study are that only 15 SCF and supply chain collaborative factors were considered, and time and scope are also limited. This study is only applied in the textile industry, so generalization may be limited.

To date, this study is the only one that has taken into consideration SCC with SCF factors to evaluate supply chain performance. This paper therefore makes this initial attempt and original contribution to this discussion, which can be helpful for those working to enhance supply chain performance, such as practitioners and policymakers.