omestic markets the competitive advantages are specific to each country and different local strategies are adopted. In global strategy, it is of vital importance to reduce total costs as well as design, production and distribution times (Globerman, Roehl, & Standifird, 2001).
Market globalisation requires achievement of high standards of performance in quality, timeliness, total costs, and customer service. To reach these levels of performance simultaneously it is necessary to change and improve all the phases in the value chain continuously. In each phase (design, purchasing, production, and distribution), these actions must involve organisation and management, management systems, and technologies. The application of physical and informative processes must be both horizontal and integrated in approach (Dent, 2002).
With regard to manufacturing, advantages can be obtained in a global strategy through: the effective utilization of scale economies; the concentration of learning in one plant or a small number of plants; the integration of operations;
...