個案總覽

This case concerns the difficulties of global sourcing for InBev, an international brewery with branches in six geographical zones. In 2006, Pascal Baltussen came to China to set up the company's international procurement office and had it up and running by the end of the year. Not only were risks such as delivery delays and rising costs constantly lurking, but in 2010 his company, Brazilian-Belgian brewer InBev, acquired the almost equally large U.S. brewer Anheuser-Busch to form the world's largest brewer, AB InBev. This posed further complications. How could Baltussen now successfully roll out his sourcing vision for China and manage internal and external challenges?

It was April 10, 2011, when the head of Whirlpool’s Asia International Procurement Office in Shanghai was informed by his colleagues that the company was about to launch a new energy-efficient refrigerator model in just six months. For the new refrigerator model, the basic difference was in the motor; the current AC motor would need to be replaced with a DC motor, which was more efficient but also more expensive. He would have to find a suitable supplier of DC motors in a very short time. Delayed sourcing of components would cause delays in the production of a new refrigerator and result in a later launch of new products. Within the home-appliance industry, the fierce level of competition meant that any delays in launching new products would result in a loss of sales. How should Whirlpool go about the process of finding a suitable supplier for the required DC motor parts? Should the company explore the possibility of developing its current supplier, or should it quickly engage an existing supplier of DC motors?