Logistics Clusters: Delivering Value and Driving Growth

by Yossi Sheffi

How logistics clusters can create jobs while providing companies with competitive advantage. Why is Memphis home to hundreds of motor carrier terminals and distribution centers? Why does the tiny island-nation of Singapore handle a fifth of the world's maritime containers and half the world's annual supply of crude oil? Which jobs can replace lost manufacturing jobs in advanced economies? Some of the answers to these questions are rooted in the phenomenon of logistics clusters—geographically concentrated sets of logistics-related business activities. In this book, supply chain management expert Yossi Sheffi explains why Memphis, Singapore, Chicago, Rotterdam, Los Angeles, and scores of other locations have been successful in developing such clusters while others have not. Sheffi outlines the characteristic “positive feedback loop” of logistics clusters development and what differentiates them from other industrial clusters; how logistics clusters “add value” by generating other industrial activities; why firms should locate their distribution and value-added activities in logistics clusters; and the proper role of government support, in the form of investment, regulation, and trade policy. Sheffi also argues for the most important advantage offered by logistics clusters in today's recession-plagued jobs, many of them open to low-skilled workers, that are concentrated locally and not “offshorable.” These logistics clusters offer what is rare in today's authentic success stories. For this reason, numerous regional and central governments as well as scores of real estate developers are investing in the development of such clusters. View a trailer for the book

368 pages, Paperback

First published September 13, 2012

About the author

Professor Yossi Sheffi is Director of the MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics (MIT CTL), and Director and Founder of the Master of Engineering in Logistics Program. He is a faculty member of the MIT Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, as well as the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society. He is an expert in systems optimization, risk analysis and supply chain management and is the author of a text book Urban Transportation Networks: Equilibrium Analysis with Mathematical Programming Methods (1985) and four award-winning management books: : The Resilient Enterprise: Overcoming Vulnerability for Competitive Advantage (2005); Logistics Clusters: Delivering Value and Driving Growth (2012); The Power of Resilience: How the Best Companies Manage the Unexpected (2015); Balancing Green: When to Embrace Sustainability in Business (and When Not to) (2018). His latest book is The New (Ab)Normal: Reshaping Business and Supply Chain Strategy Beyond Covid-19 (October 2020).

Reviews

[Russell Yarnell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall, this is a great book with a lot of information. Logistics threads through geography, economics, politics, and other facets. What got pointed out in the beginning gets repeated as a common theme through the book. It made the last half of the book boring and hard to finish.