Análise de competitividade dos custos logísticos do modal aéreo: estudo no setor produtor de relógios do PIM

Abstract

Logistics has become a very important primary activity, assigning a key factor of competitiveness to the logistics costs. The search for a sustainable competitive advantage has become a concern of organizations toward the market actualities. This research assessed the competitiveness related to the costs of logistics processes of the air transportation for the watches industry at the Manaus Industrial Hub - Polo Industrial de Manaus (PIM). This survey was conducted through qualitative, exploratory, documental and sampling (accessibility and convenience) methods, where 80% of the population answered questionnaires, with a confidence interval of 99%. Two questionnaires were used: the first collected data regarding logistics costs of participating companies and the second collected data regarding the perception of the same population regarding the avaliation of competitiveness related to the logistics costs. Logistical factors, identified through the existing relationship between suppliers and customers, were based on the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model, through the movements between inputs and outputs of finished goods, identified in logistics processes of transport, handling, storage and clearance, being the calculation done through activity-based costs method (ABC). More than 70% of companies bring their supplies using domestic air transportation. For international supplies, 42% of companies use the sea and air multimodality and 32% use only air transportation. For transportation of finished products in the domestic market, 99.7% of companies use air transportation. The months of October and November were considered as the “high season”. The seasonality of the retail sector directly impacts the purchase of watches, mainly on special celebrations as the Mother's Day, Valentine's Day and Christmas. Regarding costs, the shipping cost is the most important one, accounting for more than 85% of the total cost, followed by 6.7% at warehouse processes, 4.8% for local transportation and 2.4% of customs clearance. Thus the total logistics costs in “high season” is R$ 6.1 million, which represents 7.7% of revenues in the sector. Conclude that logistics costs in 2013 affected the competitiveness of these companies, because in the most part of the respondents opinion, watches companies located at PIM has no competitive logistics costs, considering the reality of each company, the economic scenario at PIM and national and international economic scenario as well. The reduction of logistics costs, reduction of tax burden, mainly related to the cost of personnel could help to the reduction of this indicator. Another factor that would help to the reduction of logistics costs in air transportation would be the investments in infrastructure, with bigger volume of funds invested and more quality as well. As a practical contribution, it is proposed that the model might be used as a tool for assessing logistics costs of companies. The research can be justified as per interest of the academic community, in order to develop methods for verification and management of logistics costs related to the evaluation of the competitiveness of companies.