A Reference Architecture for Reverse Logistics in the High-Tech Industry

•Manufacturers face challenges in designing & implementing reverse logistics.•This paper designs a reference architecture tailored to high-tech manufacturers.•It can support organizational and operational redesign for reverse logistics.•Instantiation demonstrates practical applicability in a real-world business context.•It has been evaluated with domain experts and industry practitioners. With the pressing need to shift towards sustainable sociotechnical systems, high-tech equipment manufacturers are facing an increasing demand for accountability in reverse logistics. Implementation of reverse logistics introduces complexities, particularly in handling the unpredictability of product returns, coordination of the network, and communication among different stakeholders along the reverse chain. To navigate these complexities and facilitate decision-making, the objective of this paper is to design a reference architecture tailored to the high-tech manufacturing sector. The proposed reference architecture encompasses a variety of reverse logistics activities, ranging from installed base management to recovery processes, to achieve supply chain circularity, and couples these witha data-driven decision-making processes to enhance efficiency and reliability throughout the reverse chain. The reference architecture is instantiated in the context of a real company case published in the literature and evaluated by domain experts and practitioners in the target industry. Evaluation results from questionnaire analysis indicate very positive responses towards our proposed solution in terms of completeness, flexibility, integration, simplicity, understandability, and usability. Overall, the reference architecture supports reverse logistics practitioners in integrated decision-making, ranging from organisational to operational levels.