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Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference: GR/R26559/01
Title: The Role, Process and Content of Stategy in Pursuing Mass Customization within Firms.
Principal Investigator: Brown, Professor S
Other Investigators:
Bessant, Professor J
Researcher Co-Investigators:
Project Partners:
Concord Lighting Ltd Thomson Machine & Tool Co Ltd
Department: School of Management
Organisation: University of Bath
Scheme: Standard Research (Pre-FEC)
Starts: 01 November 2001 Ends: 31 December 2004 Value (£): 281,415
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:
Manufact. Business Strategy Manufact. Enterprise Ops& Mgmt
EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:
Manufacturing Electronics
Related Grants:
Panel History:  
Summary on Grant Application Form
In recent years many markets have seen increased fragmentation due to the number of, and capabilities within, new entrants, resulting in what has been termed 'hypercompetition'. This in turn has meant that manufacturing and assembly plants have been faced with having to reconfigure their manufacturing processes to enable increased variety, flexibility, speed, innovation and customer responsiveness. Approaches such as TQM, BPR, MRP, and JIT, have been important contributions but have not succeeded in providing specific links between what firms need to do in terms of a wide range of enhanced capabilities, including mass customisation, and how they are to achieve these aspirations via firm-specific strategies. This is particularly true in the UK where there is evidence to suggest that firms simply do not possess strategies, or if they do it remains unclear how, and to what extent, these strategies actually support the pursuit of mass customisation. There has been a plethora of journal articles stating the need for, and expounding the virtues of, flexibility, and mass customisation but the specific role of strategy in enabling these capabilities to come into play seems to have been understated. The major hypothesis of this research is that capabilities do not come about by chance but are put in place by a strategy that will seek to develop, maintain and protect these capabilities leading to mass customisation.
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Organisation Website: http://www.bath.ac.uk