Enhancing Supply Chain Resilience to Mitigate Disruptions : A case study of Munters' supply chain to identify vulnerabilities and minimize disruption effects with supply chain resilience strategies

Globally, companies face increased market dynamics impacting their supply chains due to new mega- trends and climate change. Widespread supply chain strategies like lean management and outsourcing have contributed to reduced redundancy and a less proactive approach to handling disruptions in supply chains. Megatrends, such as globalization, have increased supply chain complexity and amplified interdependencies, leading to increased frequencies of disruptions with heightened impacts. This leads to the growing importance of adopting enhanced supply chain resilience among companies to reduce the likelihood of disruptions and minimize the impacts of such events. Disruptions cannot be entirely avoided, implying the need to find the optimal balance between investing in proactive resilience strategies and being reactive when they strike. This is the core focus for this study, which aims to suggest supply chain resilience strategies for Munters, specifically addressing the most vulnerable points in the supply chain and severe disruption e↵ects that the company is susceptible to. The study’s objective was to conduct a pilot project for one of Munters’ products, referred to as product A, to increase the company’s understanding of supply chain resilience in product A’s supply chain, leading to the following purpose: Investigate how the supply chain of product A is affected by disruptions and propose supply chain resilience improvements for Munters The study focused on three research areas: identifying vulnerable points within the supply chain of product A, examining the severe disruption effects to which Munters is most susceptible, and analyzing existing supply chain resilience strategies while proposing new ones based on the identified vulnerable points and severe disruption effects. The study was conducted with a qualitative approach where the main empirical material was gathered from interviews with employees at Munters. This was also complemented with a literature search and a workshop at Munters. The study found several vulnerable points across the supply chain of product A where Munters are especially exposed to disruptions. These vulnerabilities were identified from the upstream supply chain, starting with suppliers of essential materials like raw material 1, and extending downstream to the APAC market customers, who exhibit high volatility. Some of the important perspectives that were analyzed were high throughput of material or products, interconnection between nodes and distribution of resources. From the second research question, several disruptions and their effects on Munters’ business was found, this showed that many disruption e↵ects are interconnected, indicating that it is important to have a holistic view and consider them all. Further, a severity evaluation was done by the respondents. The findings showed that several disruption effects significantly impact the supply chain of product A, with lack of demand, lack of communication, and lack of information being the most likely to occur, while lack of production pose the greatest consequences. Lastly, the study found sev- eral supply chain resilience strategies that Munters have in place to mitigate disruption e↵ects, however also some gaps within it. Therefore nine strategies were proposed to further enhance their supply chain resilience, and strengthen Munters’ position in a changing world. These were targeted at the identified vulnerabilities and disruption effects to ensure a more effective allocation of resources. The study concludes that Munters faces several vulnerabilities within its supply chain, and that the supply chain of product A is exposed to a range of disruption effects. While some strategies for supply chain resilience are already in place, a more structured and systematic approach is needed to ensure their effectiveness. Additionally, gaps remain in the current resilience practices, and the proposed strategies presented in this study can therefore serve as valuable guidance for addressing these shortcomings.