Buyer Analytics

Good article from strategy + business about the case for back shoring. Here is an excerpt:

Moreover, some companies are amplifying materials and logistics savings from backshoring by modernizing their U.S. plants to outpace Chinese facilities. Such is the case with Diagnostic Devices Inc., a maker of blood glucose monitoring systems. In August 2009, the privately held company based in Charlotte, N.C., announced that it was moving the manufacturing of its Prodigy line of audible glucose monitors to North Carolina, ending a five-year agreement with a contract manufacturer in China under which Diagnostic Devices sent components overseas and then had the finished devices shipped back to the United States. By automating its U.S. factory with robots and other high-tech hardware and software, and by taking advantage of lower shipping fees for a mostly local customer base, Diagnostic Devices reduced its production budget by 40 percent. And there is an added bonus, according to a company spokesman: “We will also have far more control over and protection of our intellectual property, which you don’t have in China.”