M‐commerce to support the implementation of a responsive supply chain network

Purpose – This paper proposes an infrastructure of a responsive supply chain network, focusing on the deployment of the m‐commerce technology which transforms a traditional supply chain network to be more effective in coping with market changes. Design/methodology/approach – The proposed supply chain infrastructure embraces the concepts of distributed object technology, wireless markup language (WML), and extensible markup language (XML) schema to enable efficient data exchange among various data objects which reside in distributed platforms over geographically‐isolated regions, thereby leveraging the responsiveness of the entire supply chain network. A case study is conducted to evaluate the feasibility of the proposed model. Findings – Recent studies have found that wireless technology, mobile computing and internet programming techniques drive the development of mobile solution in various industries. Apart from location tracking of goods as well as relevant services, m‐commerce is able to play an important role to enhance the performance of a supply chain network, which is concerned with the proper monitoring of suppliers and production circles, encompassing a wide spectrum of value chain activities ranging from product design to after‐sales services. Originality/value – The significance of this research is the demonstration of the synergy of using a combination of emerging technologies to form an integrated system that helps achieve flexibility and agility in supply chain network.