Research On Improving A Company’s Bidding Rocess For Choosing Domestic Transportation Service Providers

There are increasing domestic and foreign enterprises turning to the logistics fieldthrough the logistics outsourcing bidding. These enterprises are seeking the "the thirdsource of profit" due to the increasing pressure on the business profit. However, the keyfactor to choose a suitable third-party logistics service provider to achieve "win-win"cooperation and improve service and control cost is the effective and well logisticsbidding. In the year of2010, the company A conducted the initial logistics bidding forthe outsourcing of its domestic transportation. But the initial service provider cannotmeet the expected bidding targets as it cannot provide the right cost and right serviceaccording to its quotation during the bidding. The real root of the failure is due to theinadequacies during the bidding process of the company A.This paper, bases on the theory of the Business Process Management, analyzes thesituation of each stage during the domestic transportation bidding process of thecompany A firstly. Then through the interview, it adapts the benchmarking method,empirical method, literature method and so on to analyze the detailed problems in eachstage during the domestic transportation bidding process of the company A. Theanalyzed problems are listed as below. The problems in the preparation stage are: theinquiry terms not clearly reflect its transportation requirements and operationaldifficulty, the quotation document and the service standard document are not combinedwith its special transportation needs to be detailed and there is no initial filtering andpositioning for the suitable service provider. The problems in the quotation stage are:the company A only offer one round for the service provider to submit the quotation andthe service standard; The problems in the jobsite stage are: the evaluation criterions ofcompany A are not comprehensive and the assessment is unreasonable; The problems inthe calibration phase are: the key calibration factor of the company A is only the priceand the company A do not conduct the relevant background investigations of the serviceprovider.Based on the above problems, this paper provides the solutions to improve eachstage during the domestic transportation bidding process of the company A. Firstly,through the interview, it adapts the methods such as by literature method, collecting thedata method, empirical method, benchmarking method, subdivision and positioning method of logistics market and so on to improve the preparation stage. Through theimprovement, it makes the company A to clearly present its logistics needs to itspotential transportation service provider as well as reasonably filter and position itspotential candidate to participate the bidding. Secondly, it combines the Game theory toimprove the quotation stage. Through the improvement, it makes the company A to getthe relatively real and reasonable quotation for price and service level. Thirdly, it adaptsthe method of the questionnaires and so on to improve the jobsite stage. Through theimprovement, it can make the company A to reasonably set up the assessment criterionsand assessment weight to reasonably do assessment of their ability. Finally, it adapts thebenchmarking method to refer the experience from the Asia country and also themethod of interviewing the management members of the company A to improve thecalibration phase.After the improvement, it sets up the assessment weight for price,service and ability and also combines the background investigation to do overallassessment of the transportation service provider for the calibration decision.This improved domestic transportation bidding process of the company A isapplied into the practice. The company A has choosed its appropriate domestictransportation service provider to achieve the improved transportation service level andto reduce its cost. This can also promote the sales strategies of rhe company A.Meanwhile, the research of this paper can rich the theory of the domestic transportationbidding process and as well as to provide the practical experience to the Group A andother companies for the domestic transportation bidding process in the relative industry.