Analysis of Toyota's Supply Chain

Toyota’s Supply Chain

Business-to-Business Marketing

Toyota Motor Corporation is a Japanese based automobile manufacturer that spans its production and sales around the globe. Toyota vehicles are produced in 26 countries and regions while sales reach across 170 countries (Toyota-global.com). As one of the world’s largest automobile manufacturers, Toyota must continue to not only create a quality product but also maintain an efficient production process. This paper will focus on the lifeline of Toyota’s production process, their suppliers and the relationships that Toyota builds and maintains with their suppliers and distributors. Topics included in the paper include a brief overview of the markets that Toyota is involved with, an analysis of their tier system for suppliers, an overview of lean production, supplier relations with other suppliers in the chain, Toyota’s quality control process with their suppliers, risks with branding with different tier suppliers, Toyota’s disaster response protocol with suppliers, as well as Toyota’s relationships with their distributors.

With a production presence in the North American, Latin American, European, African, Asian, Oceanian, and Middle Eastern markets, Toyota depends on suppliers around the world to fulfill the demand for production of Toyota made vehicles. Due to the global breadth of the Toyota brand, Toyota must operate globally by operating locally. The company does this by having 50 manufacturing companies in 26 countries and regions (Toyota-global.com). With such a large number of manufacturing companies under their belt, Toyota must ensure that they do not lose quality in their products. They do this by having everyone at Toyota follow the “Toyota Way”, the common knowledge of how Toyota should operate regardless of their location.

According to the Guiding Principles at Toyota, the company strives for long-term relationships with business partners including suppliers and dealers. In...