Covid 19 and the Automotive Industry
This individual report examines the impact of COVID-19 on the automotive industry and the management of automotive supply chains during the disruption. The assignment requires students to select a company operating in the automotive sector and focus the report on a particular product manufactured by that company. The analysis must consider how the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the supply chain and how the resulting social impacts and government-imposed restrictions affected automotive supply chain activities. The report requires consideration of both upstream and downstream activities within the selected automotive supply chain. Students are expected to analyse the effects of COVID-19 on the chosen country, organisation or product and examine how entities within the supply chain responded to the disruptive events and government restrictions. The analysis should consider the actions taken by supply chain participants and evaluate the successes and failures associated with their approaches to managing the disruption. A central requirement of the assignment is to examine supply chain management and adaptation during the pandemic. Students should explain how the selected automotive company and relevant supply chain entities responded to disruption and restrictions, considering the challenges affecting the movement and management of supply chain activities. The report should then provide independent analysis of the effectiveness of the approaches used rather than simply describing the events or responses. The assignment also requires students to develop recommendations for sustainably managing an automotive supply chain in the event of similar disruptions in the future. These recommendations should follow from the analysis of the selected company, product and supply chain and should address how supply chain management could be improved to respond more effectively to disruptive events. The suggested report structure consists of an introduction, background, supply chain impacts, supply chain management, analysis, recommendations and conclusions, followed by references. The background section should discuss the COVID-19 disruption and describe the relevant automotive supply chain, while the supply chain impacts section should examine the effects on the selected country, organisation or product. The supply chain management section should discuss how the supply chain adapted to the disruption, followed by an independent analysis of the successes and failures of those management responses. The report must be supported by ample and suitable academic and other appropriate references. The brief specifically requires Harvard referencing and states that students should cite core books, journal articles and non-journal articles. Blogs and Wikipedia should be avoided. The completed report has a maximum length of 2,000 words and the stated submission deadline is 5:00 pm on 10 December 2025.
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