MAN 698: Sustainable Business Innovations for the Circular Economy
Contents
Organisations are facing increased pressure to become more sustainable, due to issues concerning climate change, high pollution levels, and the scarcity of natural non-renewable resources.
To respond to such pressures, businesses are changing their supply chains as well as their production and logistics systems, shifting from a linear ‘take, make, use, dispose’ model to a circular ‘take, make, use, recover’ model typical of the circular economy.
This course provides a comprehensive introduction to sustainable organisational approaches, strategies and business models innovations supported by digital technologies, which are enabling business transitions from the linear to the circular economy.
Through a combination of lectures and tutorials involving case studies, practical activities and analysis of current industry trends and publications of relevance to post-graduate level students, the course covers relevant theoretical and practical aspects of sustainability, responsible management, digital technologies, and key principles of the circular economy.
More specifically, the lectures will explain and demonstrate the core subject content of the module. They will be complemented by interactive in-class activities that will include case study analysis and discussion of academic papers. These activities will provide an opportunity for the application of relevant theory into management practice.
Learning outcomes
Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:
- Articulate the main socio, economic and environmental pressures for businesses to become more responsible and sustainable.
- Understand the key fundamental principles of the circular economy.
- Characterise the main drivers, business challenges, and practices of the circular economy.
- Analyse business model innovations in the light of circular economy values.
- Explain how digital technologies enable business transitions to the circular economy.
Necessary prerequisites
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Recommended prerequisites
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| Forms of teaching and learning | Contact hours | Independent study time |
|---|---|---|
| Seminar | 3 SWS | 8 SWS |
| ECTS credits | 4 |
| Graded | yes |
| Workload | 120h |
| Language | English |
| Form of assessment | Written exam (60 min) |
| Restricted admission | yes |
| Further information | Feel free to contact Ms. Christina Paul with any questions about the course: christina.pauluni-mannheim.de |
Examiner Performing lecturer |  | Prof. Dr. Karin Hoisl Prof. Dr. Luciano Batista |
| Frequency of offering | Fall semester |
| Duration of module | 1 semester |
| Range of application | M.Sc. MMM, M.Sc. WiPäd, M.Sc. VWL, M.Sc. Wirt. Inf. |
| Preliminary course work | The preliminary course work involves the pre-reading of the book chapters and academic papers listed below. The students have to give proof of the pre-reading in order to take part in the exam. The preliminary course work will not be counted towards the final grade of the module. It is understandable that books might not be available to the students. Therefore, the book chapters pre-reading is a recommendation only. However, the pre-reading of the academic papers is compulsory, and the students must provide a 1-page summary of each paper, highlighting the key points of the paper read. The summaries will be considered as proof of the preliminary course work covered. Book Chapters: Chapter 2 of the book by Nunes, B., Batista, L., Masi, D., & Bennett, D. (2022). Sustainable Operations Management : Key Practices and Cases. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003009375 Chapters 1 and 4 of the book by Lovins, A., Braungart, M., Stahel, W., et al. (2014). A New Dynamic – Effective Business in a Circular Economy. 2nd ed. Cowes: Ellen MacArthur Foundation Publishing. Chapters 1, 2, 7, and 9 of the book by Webster, K. (2015). The Circular Economy – a wealth of flows. Cowes: Ellen MacArthur Foundation Publishing. Academic papers: Atasu, A., Dumas, C., & Van Wassenhove, L. (2021). The Circular Business Model. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2021/07/the-circular-business-model Batista, L., Bourlakis, M., Smart, P., & Maull, R. (2018). In Search of a Circular Supply Chain Archetype – A Content-Analysis-Based Literature Review. Production Planning & Control, Vol. 29, Issue 6, pp. 438–451. DOI: 10.1080/09537287.2017.1343502 Jabbour, AB., Jabbour, C., Foropon, C., & Filho, MG. (2018). When titans meet – Can industry 4.0 revolutionise the environmentally-sustainable manufacturing wave? The role of critical success factors. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 132, pp. 18–25. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2018.01.017 Stahel, W. (2016). The circular economy. Nature, 531(7595), 435–438. https://doi.org/10.1038/531435a Velenturf, A. P. M., & Purnell, P. (2021). Principles for a sustainable circular economy. Sustainable Production and Consumption, 27, pp. 1437–1457. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.SPC.2021.02.018 Xu, LD., Xu, EL., & Li, L. (2018). Industry 4.0: State of the art and future trends. International Journal of Production Research, pp. 2941–2962. https://doi.org/10.1080/00207543.2018.1444806 |
| Program-specific Competency Goals | CG 1, CG 2 |
| Literature | Books: Cooper, T. (2016). The Significance of Product Longevity. London: Routledge. Lovins, A., Braungart, M., Stahel, W., et al. (2014). A New Dynamic – Effective Business in a Circular Economy. 2nd ed. Cowes: Ellen MacArthur Foundation Publishing. Nunes, B., Batista, L., Masi, D., & Bennett, D. (2022). Sustainable Operations Management : Key Practices and Cases. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003009375 Webster, K. (2015). The Circular Economy – a wealth of flows. Cowes: Ellen MacArthur Foundation Publishing. Papers: Atasu, A., Dumas, C., & Van Wassenhove, L. (2021). The Circular Business Model. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2021/07/the-circular-business-model Batista, L., Bourlakis, M., Smart, P., & Maull, R. (2018). In search of a circular supply chain archetype – a content-analysis-based literature review. Production Planning & Control, 29(6), 438–451. https://doi.org/10.1080/09537287.2017.1343502 Batista, L., Gong, Y., Pereira, S., Jia, F., & Bittar, A. (2019). Circular Supply Chains in Emerging Economies – A comparative study of packaging recovery ecosystems in China and Brazil. International Journal of Production Research, 57(23), 7248–7268. https://doi.org/10.1080/00207543.2018.1558295 Bimpizas-Pinis, M., Calzolari, T., & Genovese, A. (2022). Exploring the transition towards circular supply chains through the arcs of integration. International Journal of Production Economics, In Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.IJPE.2022.108666 Bocken, N. M. P., de Pauw, I., Bakker, C., & van der Grinten, B. (2016). Product design and business model strategies for a circular economy. Journal of Industrial and Production Engineering, 33(5), 308–320. https://doi.org/10.1080/21681015.2016.1172124 Braz, A. C., & de Mello, A. M. (2022). Circular economy supply network management: A complex adaptive system. International Journal of Production Economics, 243, 108317. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.IJPE.2021.108317 De Angelis, R., Howard, M., & Miemczyk, J. (2018). Supply Chain Management and the Circular Economy: Towards the Circular Supply Chain. Production Planning and Control, 29(6), 425–437. Ekins, P., Domenech, T., Drummond, P., Bleischwitz, R., Hughes, N., & Lotti, L. (2019). The Circular Economy: What, Why, How and Where. OECD Centre for Entrepreneurship, SMEs, Regions and Cities. https://www.oecd.org/cfe/regionaldevelopment/Ekins-2019-Circular-Economy-What-Why-How-Where.pdf [Accessed on 05 October 2022]. Geissdoerfer, M., Pieroni, M. P. P., Pigosso, D. C. A., & Soufani, K. (2020). Circular business models: A review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 277, 123741. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.JCLEPRO.2020.123741 Genovese, A., Acquaye, A. A., Figueroa, A., & Koh, S. C. L. (2017). Sustainable supply chain management and the transition towards a circular economy: Evidence and some applications. Omega, 66, 344–357. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.omega.2015.05.015 Kjaer, L. L., Pigosso, D. C. A., Niero, M., Bech, N. M., & McAloone, T. C. (2019). Product/ Schilling, L., & Seuring, S. (2022). Sustainable value creation through information technology-enabled supply chains in emerging markets. International Journal of Logistics Management, 33(3), 1001–1016. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJLM-04-2021-0206/FULL/XML Velenturf, A. P. M., & Purnell, P. (2021). Principles for a sustainable circular economy. Sustainable Production and Consumption, 27, 1437–1457. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.SPC.2021.02.018 Walker, H., Seuring, S., Sarkis, J., & Klassen, R. (2014). Sustainable operations management: recent trends and future directions. International Journal of Operations and Production Management, 34(5). https://doi.org/10.1108/IJOPM-12-2013-0557 |
| Course outline | The main topics covered in the course are: Theoretical fundaments of the circular economy
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