Abstract

The structuring of the automotive supply chain in tiers, which has progressively taken place over the last twenty years, has increased the power of the so called Tier 1 suppliers in respect to Tier 2 and Tier 3 suppliers. This restructuring process has been particularly strong in Italy, where the local champion fiat has been integrated with its us partner Chrysler. This paper analyze the main differences in terms of technical efficiency and profitability observed between relevant Tier 1 suppliers and Tier 2-3 suppliers before and during the recent crisis. The efficiency results from Data Envelopment Analysis are treated in a second stage phase using the truncated regression model, following the recent development in this field.