IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ids/ijlsma/v27y2017i4p466-486.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An analysis of strategic groups in the third-party logistics industry

Author

Listed:
  • Roberta Scarsi
  • Riccardo Spinelli

Abstract

Third-party logistics is a very heterogeneous industry, moving towards a progressive concentration and services differentiation at the top, but still made up by companies that differ in terms of size, supplied services, and background. This structural variety offers the starting point for a grouping analysis, which aims to identify strategic groups among major players in the industry. 199 third-party logistics service providers (3PLs) worldwide are analysed applying a two-step lustering technique to a wide set of variables which refer to the main strategic drivers for 3PLs. Three strategic groups emerge from the analysis. The first one includes major global players; the second one encompasses less advanced local providers; the third one embraces a large number of firms which are experiencing a transition from simple to more complex and internationally oriented business models.

Suggested Citation

  • Roberta Scarsi & Riccardo Spinelli, 2017. "An analysis of strategic groups in the third-party logistics industry," International Journal of Logistics Systems and Management, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 27(4), pages 466-486.
    • Handle: RePEc:ids:ijlsma:v:27:y:2017:i:4:p:466-486
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=85224
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ids:ijlsma:v:27:y:2017:i:4:p:466-486. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sarah Parker (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=134 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.