A Comparative Study on New Product Development Projects: Supplier-client Partnerships in Manufacturing Industry

Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Technology, University of Johannesburg, South Africa

^* Corresponding author: vhashe@uj.ac.za

Abstract

This paper was to investigate, explore and gain an understanding of the factors that enable and support supplier-client collaboration in New Product Development Projects (NPDP) within the South African manufacturing industry. This study was based on two case studies where two NPDP within South African on two different firms were studied. The predominant focus of this report studied the supplier involvement and relationship factors, supplier selection factors, and cultural environment and collaboration factors. The main data used was collected via interviews and internal company documents. The collected data was then analyzed and the outcome provided insight into the factors and relationship between these factors. This study noted that firms can enter into collaboration to accelerate the product development process. This includes enhancing the ability of the firm to respond to key customer needs. Firms can make use of the collaboration advantage where they see a market opportunity where their teams have less to no expertise and skills required to capture the opportunity. In addition, research and development costs stand to be reduced significantly, where the collaboration partner is chosen effectively. This study concludes by seeing it as beneficial to firms to collaborate with their suppliers under proper management.