CONDITIONS OF INTER-FIRM CO-OPERATION IN A VIRTUAL ENTERPRISE CONCEPT : THE CASE OF AUTOMOTIVE SECTOR IN PORTUGAL

Moniz, António and Kovács, Ilona (2000): CONDITIONS OF INTER-FIRM CO-OPERATION IN A VIRTUAL ENTERPRISE CONCEPT : THE CASE OF AUTOMOTIVE SECTOR IN PORTUGAL. Published in: Proceedings Rencontre International GERPISA No. 8 (2000): pp. 1-8.

Abstract

One can assist to significant changes in the organisation of manufacturing systems during the last years. Lean production, network enterprise or the virtual enterprises are reference concepts of the re-organisation of manufacturing systems. Some authors mention a new enterprise paradigm, of generalisation of intelligent manufacture, organised in networks and assisted by information and communication technologies. The first part of the paper develops a critical approach to the illusion connected to these concepts, calling the attention to the diversity of the type of relationships among firms. If virtual enterprises (VE) are networks of firms with intensive usage of ICT, one can verify a predominance of a technicist perspective. This one considers that the development of VEs is a technological problem, of development and management of information systems, and of entrepreneurial share of different databases. Sociology can be useful, even fundamental in an anthropocentric approach. The last part of the paper is on the Portuguese situation in the automobile sector, approaching the types of entrepreneurial organisation.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: networks; manufacturing systems; virtual enterprises; automobile sector; Portugal
• Subjects: M - Business Administration and Business Economics ; Marketing ; Accounting ; Personnel Economics > M1 - Business Administration > M14 - Corporate Culture ; Diversity ; Social Responsibility; L - Industrial Organization > L6 - Industry Studies: Manufacturing > L62 - Automobiles ; Other Transportation Equipment ; Related Parts and Equipment; L - Industrial Organization > L2 - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior > L23 - Organization of Production; J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J2 - Demand and Supply of Labor > J24 - Human Capital ; Skills ; Occupational Choice ; Labor Productivity; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O3 - Innovation ; Research and Development ; Technological Change ; Intellectual Property Rights > O33 - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences ; Diffusion Processes; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O1 - Economic Development > O14 - Industrialization ; Manufacturing and Service Industries ; Choice of Technology

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