Complex Network Structure Study of Guangzhou Automobile-Industry Supply Chain

In the era of global business and competitiveness, supply chain network has emerged as the critical factor for the success of business. Supply chain network could be seen as a complex network which consists of lots of suppliers, retailers, consumers and their relations. The structure of complex supply chain network is an important issue. With emphasis on the topology characteristic such as small-world and scale-free, complex network theory grows rapidly. It has attracted various researchers in the world. In this paper, we propose a method to measure the attributes of complex network firstly. Then, the authors investigated Guangzhou automotive industry supply chain network. This network is formed by 84 enterprises, which Guangzhou Honda, Dongfeng-Nissan and Guangzhou-Toyota are key hubs of the network. Some statistical attributes of the network were calculated, such as degree distribution, average path length, and clustering coefficient. The statistical result shows that Guangzhou automotive industry supply chain network is a complex network possessing attributes of small-word and scale-free.