Commonalities and Differences between Service and Manufacturing Supply Chains: Combining Operations Management Studies with Supply Chain Management
Ming Zhou • Taeho Park
San Jose State University, San Jose, CA

John Yi
Saint Joseph's University, Philadelphia, PA

The service sector of the US economy has been gaining importance. As the service sector evolves, the study of service supply chain starts to gain attention. In this study, we conduct an exploratory review on the studies of manufacturing and service supply chains. We focus on the studies that explore the differences and commonalities between manufacturing and service supply chains. We combine operations management literature with supply chain studies in order to provide an interdisciplinary framework that brings up both the operational and strategic views on the management commonalities and differences between the two types of supply chains.

I. INTRODUCTION

The study of services has lagged the study of manufacturing. When Fred Harvey proposed that services can be standardized and managed systematically, standardization and systematic management had been applied in the manufacturing sector by pioneers such as Eli Whitney and Frederick Taylor. The first business school course that focused on service management was not introduced until 1973 (Heineke and Davis, 2006). Despite the lag of academic attention, the service sector has been gaining importance as the US economy becomes more and more service-centric. According to the US Census Bureau, the service sector accounts for fifty five percent of the US economic activities in 2007 (Services Annual Survey, 2007). Along with the evolvement of service industries, service research starts to catch up and a variety of aspects of service management are identified and explored. In recent years, one aspect of service management, the service supply chain, has