Impact of plant size and focus on productivity: An empirical study

Management Science

Volumn 42, Issue 7, 1996, Pages 1065-1081

  Brush, Thomas ^a   Karnani, Aneel ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

Focussed Factory; Manufacturing Strategy; Plant Focus; Plant Size; Productivity; Scale

Indexed keywords

EID: 0001187481     PISSN: 00251909     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.42.7.1065     Document Type: Article

References (54)

1. Abernathy, W. and K. Wayne, "Limits of the Learning Curve," Harvard Business Rev., 52 (1974), 109-119.
2. Acs, Z. J., D. B. Audretsch, and B. Carlsson, "Flexibility, Plant Size and Industrial Restructuring" Z. J. Acs and D. B. Audretsch (Eds.), The Economics of Small Firms: A European Challenge, Studies in Industrial Organization, 11, Kluwer Academic, Norwell MA, 1990.
3. Business Week, "Giant Killers on the Loose" Peter Burrows, Special 1994 Bonus Issue - The Information Revolution, 108-110.
4. _, "Small is Beautiful Now in Manufacturing," October 22, 1984, 152-156.
5. _, "Is Your Company Too Big?," March 27, 1989, 84-94.
6. Bolwijn, P. T. and T. Kumpe, "Manufacturing in the 1990s - Productivity, Flexibility, and Innovation," Long Range Planning, 23, 4 (1990), 44-57.
7. Carlsson, B., "The Evolution of Manufacturing Technology and Its Impact on Industrial Structure: An International Study," Small Business Economics 1, 1 (1989), 21-37.
8. Caves, R. and P. Ghemawat, "Identifying Mobility Barriers," Strategic Management J., 13 (1992), 1-12.
9. _, J. Khalilzadeh-Shirazi, and M. E. Porter, "Scale Economies in Statistical Analyses of Market Power," Rev. Economics and Statistics, 57 (1975), 133-140.
10. Daft, R. L., Organization Theory and Design, West Publishing Company, St. Paul, MN, 1986.
11. David, P., "Learning by Doing and Tariff Protection: A Reconsideration of the Case of the Ante-Bellum U.S. Cotton Textile Industry," J. Economic History, 30, 3 (1970), 521-601.
12. _, "The Horndal Effect' in Lowell, 1834-1856," Technical Choice, Innovation, and Economic Growth, Cambridge University Press, London, 1975, also in Explorations in Economic History, 10, 2 (Winter 1973), 131-150.
13. _, "The Horndal Effect' in Lowell, 1834-1856," Technical Choice, Innovation, and Economic Growth, Cambridge University Press, London, 1975, also in Explorations in Economic History, 10, 2 (Winter 1973), 131-150.
14. Davidson, R. and J. G. Mackinnon, Estimation and Inference in Econometrics, Oxford University Press, England, 1993.
15. De Meyer, A., J. Nakane, J. Miller, and K. Ferdows, "Flexibility: The Next Competitive Battle The Manufacturing Futures Survey," Strategic Management J., 10 (1989), 135-144.
16. Galbraith, J. R., "Organization Design: An Information Processing View," Interfaces, 4, 3 (1974), 28-36.
17. Gold, B., "Changing Perspectives on Size, Scale, and Returns: An Interpretive Survey," J. Economic Literature, 19 (1981), 5-53.
18. Harvard Business School, Reliance Electric Motor Division (B), Case Study, Boston, MA, 1978.
19. Hayes, R. H. and S. C. Wheelwright, Restoring Our Competitive Edge., John Wiley, New York, 1984.
20. Hughes, W. R., "Scale Frontiers in Electric Power," Technological Change in Regulated Industries, W. M. Cohren (Ed.), Washington DC, 1971.
21. Industry Week, "Thinking Small Helps Spur Production," September 21, 1981, 98-100.
22. _, "Whaddya Mean You're Too Small'?," June 4, 1990, 12-14.
23. Iron Age, "Are Dinosaur Plants in Their Death Throes?," June 14, 1973, 55-57.
24. Johnson, H. T. and R. S. Kaplan, "The Rise and Fall of Management Accounting," 68, 7 (1987), Management Accounting, 22-30.
25. Karmarkar, U. S., "Lot Sizes, Lead Times and In-Process Inventories," Management Sci., 33, 3 (1987), 409-418.
26. Kaufman, B. E., "Scale of Plant Relative to Market Size in U.S. Manufacturing," Southern Economic J., 46, 2 (1979), 635-638.
27. Kekre, S. and K. Srinivasan, "Broader Product Line: A Necessity to Achieve Success?," Management Sci., 36, 10 (1990), 1216-1229.
28. Kelley, M. R. and H. Brooks, The State of Computerized Automation in U. S. Manufacturing, Center for Business and Government, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 1988.
29. Kimberly, J. R., "Organizational Size and the Structuralist Perspective: A Review, Critique, and Proposal," Administrative Sci. Quarterly, 21, 4 (1976), 577-597.
30. Kmenta, J., Elements of Econometrics, Second Edition, Macmillan Publishing, New York, 1986.
31. Levin, R. C., "Technical Change and Optimal Scale: Some Evidence and Implications," Southern Economic J., 44, 2 (1977), 208-221.
32. Levin, S. G., S. L. Levin, and J. B. Meisel, "A Dynamic Analysis of the Adoption of a New Technology: The Case of Optical Scanners," Rev. Economics and Statistics, 51 (1987), 12-17.
33. Lieberman, M. B., "Market Growth, Economies of Scale, and Plant Size in the Chemical Processing Industries," J. Industrial Economics, 36, 2 (1987), 632-649.
34. _, L. J. Lau, and M. D. Williams, "Firm-Level Productivity and Management Influence: A Comparison of U.S. and Japanese Automobile Producers," Management Sci., 36, 10 (1990), 1193-1215.
35. Manne, A. S., "Capacity Expansion and Probabilistic Growth," Econometrica, 29, 1961, 632-649.
36. March, A. and D. A. Garvin, Copeland Corporation, Case Studies, Harvard Business School, Cambridge, MA, 1986.
37. Miller, J. and T. Vollmann, "The Hidden Factory," Harvard Business Rev., 63 (1985), 142-150.
38. Moroney, J. R., "Cobb-Douglas Production Functions and Returns to Scale in U.S. Manufacturing Industry", Western Economic J., 6, 1 (1967), 39-51.
39. Pesch, M. J. and R. G. Schroeder, "An Empirical Analysis of Plant Focus," Working Paper, Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, 1991.
40. Peters, T., "Rethinking Scale," California Management Review (Fall 1992), 7-29.
41. _and R. H. Waterman, Jr., In Search of Excellence, Harper and Row, New York, 1982.
42. Piore, M. J. and C. F. Sabel, The Second Industrial Divide: Possibilities for Prosperity, Basic Books, New York, 1984.
43. Scherer, F. M. et al., The Economics of Multi-Plant Operation, Harvard Press, Cambridge, MA, 1975.
44. Schmenner, R. W., Making Business Location Decisions, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1982.
45. _, "Before You Build a Big Factory," Haroard Business Review, July-August (1976), 100-104.
46. _ and R. Cook, "Explaining Productivity Differences in North Carolina Factories," J. Oper. Management, 5, 3 (1985), 273-289.
47. _, "Every Factory Has a Life Cycle," Harvard Business Review, 61, 2 (1983), 121-129.
48. Skinner, W., "The Focused Factory," Harvard Business Review, May-June (1974a), 113-121.
49. _, "The Decline, Fall, and Renewal of Manufacturing Plants," Industrial Engineering, 6, 10 (1974b), 32-38.
50. Tomatzky, L., M. Fleischer, and A. Chakrabarti, The Processes of Technological Innovation, Lexington Books, Lexington, MA, 1990.
51. The Economist, "Think of the 1992 Company; Size Alone May Not Help Companies to Prosper in Europe's Single Market," January 20, 1990, 16.
52. The Wall Street Journal, "Small Flexible Plants May Play Crucial Role in U.S. Manufacturing," January 13, 1993.
53. U.S. Department of Commerce, Survey of Plant Capacity, Current Industrial Reports, Bureau of the Census, 1982.
54. Womack, J. P., D. T. Jones, and D. Roos, The Machine That Changed the World, Harper Collins Publishers, New York, 1990.