UPS poll finds Asian executives turn to outside supply chain managers

UPS poll finds Asian executives turn to outside supply chain managers    A poll commissioned by UPS found that business leaders in Asia say they have turned to outside experts to manage their supply chains by a three-to-one margin over those in the United States and Europe, UPS said in a press release Tuesday.
   Fourteen percent of the U.S. and European executives surveyed listed customer loyalty as the most important business issue they faced, compared to only 2 percent of the Asian executives, who said a much more important business issue facing them is expanding to new markets.
   In discussing their embrace of outside expertise in running supply chains, 29 percent of the Asian executives said they had moved very extensively or completely to outsourcing. In contrast, only 11 percent of the U.S. and European executives had gone so far.
   Harris Interactive conducted the online survey on behalf of UPS on April 8-15 among 70 high-level business executives who attended Longitudes 2005 in Chicago in April, or who attended two similar conferences in 2004 in New York City in April or Paris in October. The same online survey was also completed between Sept. 22 to Oct. 6 by 35 high-level business executives who attended the Longitudes Shanghai 2005 conference.