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Technology uncertainty poses significant challenges to manufacturers, as rapid changes in product and/or process standards and specifications can disrupt the smooth flow of materials in extended supply chains. Practitioners and researchers alike who take a relational perspective widely regard supplier involvement as a potentially effective strategy to cope with technology uncertainty, as focal manufacturers can tap into their upstream supply networks for complementary resources and capabilities. However, the literature lacks a nuanced understanding of the supplier involvement processes. Specifically, the role of resource dependence for supplier involvement has yet to be systematically understood. To fill this gap, this study aims to combine the relational perspective with the resource-dependence perspective to explore how buyer dependence, supplier dependence and buyer–supplier interdependence influence buyers’ decision-making on tapping into upstream supply networks for coping with technology uncertainty.

To test the hypotheses, a survey is conducted among Dutch firms with more than 50 employees in the discrete manufacturing industries (ISIC 28-35), resulting in a sample of 125 manufacturers.

First, there is a significantly positive relationship between technology uncertainty and supplier involvement, giving support to the expectation that buyers are indeed involving their key suppliers in the product/process design and improvement, as a response to technology uncertainty. Second, buyer dependence and interdependence are found to be positively moderating the relationship between technology uncertainty and supplier involvement. In contrast, supplier dependence has a negative moderating effect on the baseline relationship.

The authors contribute to a relational view on buyer–supplier relationships by showing that the validity of this view, in the context of technology uncertainty, is contingent on the resource dependence between buyers and suppliers, and the authors contribute to the supply chain management literature more generally by combining a relational perspective with a resource-dependence perspective.

The findings provide several nuanced insights into the effect of resource dependence (buyer dependence, supplier dependence and interdependence) on supplier involvement for coping with technology uncertainty.

This study contributes to the supply chain management research by going beyond the benefits of supplier involvement and highlights the circumstances under which supplier involvement is likely to occur.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework for identifying and managing supply quality risk (SQR).

The research method began with a literature study to form a grounded model of how organizations identify and perceive SQR and associate various supplier quality management practices (SQMPs) with SQR sources. The second phase consisted of structured interviews at three companies in the food machinery industry in order to refine these concepts and examine causal relationships.

The findings from this study indicate that firms may be more likely to implement integrative supply chain practices when supplier or component sources of SQR are considered to be a significant threat. Conversely, market sources of SQR were generally not perceived as being significant, and therefore do not warrant as much direct intervention in their management.

Most previous studies on supply chain risk focus on delivery disruptions. However, there is a lack of knowledge on identifying, assessing, and managing supply risk associated with quality. By addressing these issues and outlining future research directions the authors help provide a starting point for contributing to this line of study in supply risk theory and practice.

The framework developed in this paper can aid supply chain professionals in understanding what constitutes SQR and providing insight to approaches for managing this form of supply risk.

This is the first empirical study that the authors are aware of that links various sources of SQR to specific SQMPs.