Assignment (60 points): In practice, what we find, is that those companies that are the market leaders, are the ones who have sought and achieved the twin peaks of excellence: they have gained both, cost leadership and product/service differentiation. The figure below shows this position (The Goal), one, that it is very difficult to imitate by competitors. Operations and supply chain management plays a pivotal role in enabling companies to occupy or at least begin moving towards this position. High The Goal: Superior customer value at less costs Value Advantage: - Tailored products/services -Reliability - Responsiveness -Speed Low Low High Cost advantage: - Asset turnover - Capacity utilization - Cost-competitive products and services -Supply base consolidation Your task will be to select from the three options below two operations and supply chain management themes of your choice and reflect on the following question: In what way do you believe they (the themes you selected] help a firm in its efforts to occupy the position of value and cost advantage as depicted in the above diagram? You can frame your answer in the context of your firm that you work for or provide a general reflection for "a firm". I. Options of operations and supply management themes: 2. Spend analytics and category strategy development a. What role spend analytics plays for harnessing corporate spend? b. What role spend analytics plays in identifying souring risk? c. What is the connection between savings and risk management? d. What is the connection between spend analytics and category strategy