Supply chain integration systems by small engineering to order companies

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to develop a model for overcoming the key barriers to the implementation of supply chain integration systems by small engineering to order (ETO) companies.Design/methodology/approach – Qualitative data from three in‐depth case studies are collected. The three case studies are small UK ETO companies, i.e. manufacturing companies that customise generic product types to meet specific customer requirements and only make these to order.Findings – The paper identifies three key barriers: management awareness of the benefits and implementation challenges of these systems, perceived risk to the business and to information security and intensity of skills needed for their successful implementation. The paper proposes an iterative model that aims at overcoming these barriers.Research limitations/implications – The authors apply the knowledge on technology adoption in the context of small ETO companies to explain the apparent lack of implementation of supply chain integration s...