Many products in the marketplace today are built from components designed and manufactured by sub-contractors. While the extent of this practice is not well known to consumers, the manufacture and sale of multi-component units that use parts from many different companies continues to grow.

Required:

If the assembling company is using value-chain analysis in its strategic planning, comment on the following:

(a) The cost justification for subcontracting.

(b) The willingness of consumers to buy products they know contain subcontracted parts.

(c) The problems of quality control facing the assembling company.