How can companies develop and maintain global supply chain networks that are robust—that is, capable of maintaining an uninterrupted flow of goods and materials—when confronted with a geographically spreading disruption that could cause the shutdown of multiple suppliers at once? To answer this question, this article combines an empirical analysis of supply chain networks of three global automotive manufacturers with computational experiments. The results reveal that even when a small fraction of buyers adopt regionalizing supplier-selection practices—those in which a buyer chooses geographically proximate suppliers, whether to the buyer or its current suppliers—the supply chain network becomes more robust.

当面临可能导致多个供应商同时关闭的地理分布中断时，公司如何开发和维护强大的全球供应链网络——也就是说，能够保持货物和材料的不间断流动？为了回答这个问题，本文将全球三大汽车制造商供应链网络的实证分析与计算实验相结合。结果表明，即使一小部分买家采用区域化供应商选择做法——即买家选择地理位置邻近的供应商，无论是对买方还是其当前供应商——供应链网络也会变得更加强大。