Operation and Technology Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Operation and Technology Management - Essay Example The M&S products are not according to the changing trends in fashion industry. Main reason behind this is that the supply chain of M&S is weak as compare to the industry. Though it has a well defined supply chain process but it involved too many steps. The value chain steps of M&S are almost double of their major competitor i.e. Zara. Zara has become very dominant in fashion industry due to its frequent and rapid launching of new stylish apparels (Ghemawat and Nueno, 2006). M&S have approximately 12 months lead time for each seasonal collection which is considered as very long time span as the fashion industry has become very fast in launching new apparels. M&S outsources some of key activities of their value chain to the regions where raw materials and labours are cheap. This shows that company does not manufacture the complete products all in one place and it takes long time for them to manufacture apparels. Furthermore, the quality control process of M&S is very thorough and they also spend much time on this process. The fashion industry is evolving at rapid rate and the clothes and products become obsolete within no time because of the changing needs of the customers. Therefore, the company needs to introduce stylish products frequently and rapidly in order to participate in fashion game. For that purpose, they need to make supply chain efficient. Another factor, which hinders the participation of M&S in the ‘fashion’ game is launching of season apparel only. They produce few products a year which are in Spring/summer and Winter/Autumn. Their competitors such as Zara and H&M have moved away from this technique and offer many new clothes in different styles all over the year according to the customer taste (Arrigo, 2010). The companies operating in the fashion industry are based on three main elements or factors i.e. designers, market specialists and customers. M&S have separate work place for each factor and is not able to