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Dell's Supply Chain

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According to Chopra and Meindl, Dell’s supply chain has been very successful because “The online channel has proved very effective for the sale of computer hardware and by 2009 represented about half the sales in this category. After more than a decade of tremendous success selling its PCs only online, Dell started to sell PCs through retail stores such as Wal-Mart in 2007.” Dell’s online supply chain manages through supplier, Dell, and customer. In addition to the retail supply chain, Dell manages through the supplier, Dell, retail store, and customer. Therefore, they are hitting their targets on every end of the market share by being successful in every way. The main supply chain challenges that Dell is now facing is the low-cost hardware. Chopra and Meindl stated, “For low-cost, standardized hardware, however, the online channel is significantly less attractive because its main strength, inventory reduction through aggregation, is not as valuable for low-cost, standardized configurations.” Therefore, Dell is not strong in this area and they are aware of this. In addition, it appears that Dell is not focused in this area as well. Chopra and Meindl suggested, “Online sales allow Dell to significantly improve its performance for high-value, customized hardware in terms of both responsiveness and cost.” Dell is more focused on their success on what they are doing so well which is continuing selling their high-value customized hardware. In fact, if I was a part of their supply chain team I would continue to keep doing the right things. Why change something if it’s not broken. Looking at our textbook in table 4-10 it appears the efficient funds transfer, inventory, facilities, and customer experience are significantly high for customized hardware. Although, Dell does very well in the area of impact for standard low-cost hardware with positive remarks

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