Improvement towards procurement 4.0, a case study for a construction company

Abstract

This research investigates procurement challenges in Thai Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) projects, using STC as the case study, and develops a conceptual Procurement 4.0 ERP model to improve coordination, information flow, and operational control across the engineering–procurement–construction interface. The study was motivated by recurring procurement problems observed in construction activities, particularly weak supply chain and logistics control, frequent fragmented communication within cross-department integration and hence the consequent mismatches between design engineering and procurement practices. In response, the research examines how a digitally integrated Procurement 4.0 approach can strengthen real-time construction visibility, improve cross-functional design engineering coordination, and provide a standard systematic foundation for procurement operation for the entire EPC project lifecycle. The research adopts a qualitative case study methodology, following problem identification and categorisation, Pareto analysis, fishbone analysis, stakeholder and RACI assessment, and Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA), which process identifies top twenty recurring project problems in eight categories. In addition, the problem identification unveiled that the critical issues were procurement management inefficiency between the EPC contractor and supply chain, logistics management and control failure, and its insufficient cross-department integration for technical work and interface errors with design engineering. Then the Pareto highlighted four categories with 81.5% of total Severity-weighted frequency score accounted, further concluded that procurement issues in EPC projects to be the fundamental system-level, functional integration problem. Based on the analytical findings, the research principal is to design a conceptual Procurement 4.0 ERP model customised for EPC procurement scenarios, and its design model integrates stakeholder interaction with role-based responsibility logic, vendor coordination, milestone-based tracking, and procurement visibility into a standard conceptual architecture and workflow control. The research purpose is not to claim full system development or complete operational implementation at project scale, but to propose a feasible conceptual design model, which was reviewed by organisational experts and considered suitable for limited pilot testing in a controlled project context. Hence, the study contributes a structured digital procurement conceptual model for Procurement 4.0 transformation which is valued to support agile, resilient and structured project delivery in EPC construction.