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Managing the movement of components and products from suppliers to customers and ultimately to end-users is undergoing rapid changes. Supply chain management has increasingly gained attention as companies have sought to reduce costs and improve service performance in a quest for gaining an advantage on the competition. Previous studies have examined the nature of vendor managed inventory relationships between suppliers and retailers as well as those factors that influence the third-party logistics outsourcing decision. However, researchers to date have not examined the issue of logistics outsourcing when a vendor managed inventory relationship exists between firms upstream in the supply chain. This study sought to address this gap in the literature. Five literature streams provided a theoretical base fo