Global Footprint Design

The configuration of global production networks is often times rather the result of coincidence than strategy. Evaluation of production locations and network configurations is mostly based on costs and operative restrictions, but few approaches exist to evaluate possible benefits. “Global Footprint Design”, is an integrated heuristic approach to measure and evaluate the strategic value of a specific configuration of a production network with respect to the network’s business environment. The strategic value is herein deduced as the degree of correspondence of the network’s characteristics to the procurement market on the one hand and to the sales market on the other.