Build-to-Order: Impacts, Trends and Open Issues

The promise of BTO has been widely discussed: lower finished vehicle stocks and higher margins on the one hand have to be balanced against the higher cost of providing flexibility in manufacturing on the other. In this chapter we discuss the impacts of BTO on the OEM as well as the component supply and distribution chain, and outline the key challenges that OEMs face on their way to implementing BTO, including approaches for mitigating these.