Five years after Japan quake, rewiring of auto supply chain hits limits

© Maryna Bielodied

If the definition of lunacy is someone doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results, then given Japan’s history with earthquakes and the tsunamis that often accompany them, its automotive manufacturers needed to redesign their supply chains. But that presented particular problems in a high-cost society like Japan’s: “Holding more inventory, or adding another production line as a business contingency measure may improve a company’s robustness in the face of disaster, but it won’t necessarily improve its global competitiveness,” one expert warned, “in fact if they do they would probably go bust before the next earthquake.”