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AI in supply chain automation is gradually reshaping how core functions operate, particularly in procurement, warehousing, and logistics. Key Insight: The use of AI in supply chain automation is producing tangible benefits across procurement, warehousing, and logistics.
If youve followed our blog over the years, youll know that weve shared lots of information about distribution networkdesign, why its vital to get it right, how long it should take, the importance of reviewing the network every so often, and various elements of design such as determining the number of warehouses and where to locate them.
At each company, there is a relationship between the metrics of growth, margin, inventory, customer service, and asset strategy. For the purpose of this article, I will use Return on Invested Capital (ROIC) as the proxy metric to discuss asset utilization.) Understanding this relationship requires modeling. (A
I know that your primary focus is procurement. If S&OP efforts were that effective, don’t you think that we would have made more progress against inventory levels, margin, and growth? In part, this results in increasing swings in inventory in response to shifts in consumer demand as one moves further up the supply chain.
Despite two decades of advancement in supply chain technologies, companies are struggling to gain balance at the intersection of operating margin, inventory turns and case fulfillment. I have learned that supply chain systems are more complex than I originally thought, and that the relationships between supply chain metrics are nonlinear.
In May 2025, one in seven home-purchase agreements fell through resulting in the cancellation of 56,000 purchase contracts. Ask a procurement or transportation professional if they have a good demand signal and expect a laugh. A negative FVA increases cost, inventory, and risk. The ripple effects are pervasive.
The market for networkdesign tools was growing at a moderate rate, and most of the market had invested in technologies from either i2 Technologies (then termed i2 Strategist) or Logictools. Today, supply chain design has become a process all to its own. It could no longer be just about inventory levels. The reason?
I am currently doing research on inventory management. In the research, I ask inventory planners to define resilience. Of the twenty companies interviewed, only one can answer the question, “Do you have a good inventory plan?” No technology in the market measures inventory health. Today, this is not the case.
Primed for transactional efficiency, these legacy architectures based on relational databases drive order-to-cash and procure-to-pay efficiencies. Current Familiarity with Analytic Concepts (Fall 2022 Snapshot) Preamble Supply chain leaders love their rows and columns. I term this our data jail. The focus of the Gartner Magic Quadrant.)
This means continuously assessing the trade-off between the total cost to serve and meeting customer demand and minimizing lost sales. The increasing need for constantly analyzing these trade-offs across the supply chain networks has highlighted the need for digital twins and what-if capabilities in networkdesign solutions.
Tactical forecasting helps us to think through the questions of long-term asset strategies and sort through networkdesign optimization alternatives. In contrast, the demand organization that I am advocating is an analytics group that crosses over sales and marketing into supply. 2) Invest in New Forms of Analytics.
Truck drivers report that maintenance issues are a constant nightmare. Manufacturers build “control towers” but there no network dial tone between parties to enable prescriptive analytics and alerting.). There is not a one-to-one relationship between a container and a purchase order. What Should Be Done.
I am speaking this morning at the Terra Technology conference and doing a book signing of my new book, Supply Chain Metrics That Matter. In parallel, I have been hard at work on a report on multi-tier inventory optimization for the last two weeks. It will delay my report. It is morning in Orlando. The sun is rising.
I wrote my first report on Sales and Operations Planning (S&OP) while sitting on the floor in the Atlanta airport in 2005 when I was an AMR Research analyst. I wrote many reports on airport floors in those days–electrical plugs were just too scarce.) Sales and Operations Maturity Model from 2005-2008. Mistake #3.
Conversely, just 8% of businesses with less capable supply chains report above-average growth. 1) In many businesses, the supply chain has never been subject to a design process, but has instead just … evolved. That figure highlights like no other how critical the interrelations are between an enterprise and its supply chain.
If you’ve followed our blog over the years, you’ll know that we’ve shared lots of information about distribution networkdesign, why it’s vital to get it right, how long it should take, the importance of reviewing the network every so often, and various elements of design such as determining the number of warehouses and where to locate them.
In this scenario, by adopting an adaptive supply chain, the retailer uses real-time data analytics to identify emerging trends and collaborate closely with suppliers to quickly adjust production and inventory levels to meet customer demand. This collaboration enables faster response times and cost savings.
When it comes to the management of inventory in value chains, frustration abounds. Executive, after executive, lament, “They have purchased many technologies and sponsored many projects to reduce inventories, but they are not seeing results.” Inventory is the culmination of many business decisions.
This acquisition is deeply rooted in LLamasoft’s goal to dominate the networkdesign market. LLamasoft Is Aggressively Aggregating NetworkDesign Software Assets. LLamasoft is pushing for dominance in the networkdesign optimization software market. I mpact #2. Growth: Eye on Global Expansion.
Granular data by volume is a must to be able to manage replenishment, networkdesign, and inventory targets. The budget is for a fiscal year with quarter reporting and updates. The direct connection between the two processes increases costs and increases error. Time horizon. Bias and error. The takeaway?
Procurement has never played such an important role in the increasingly globalised economy. Has procurement fundamentally changed itself in the past 10 years? Strategic Procurement can mean totally different things in different industries and sectors. The time when Procurement was almost a synonym to Purchasing has long gone.
NASDAQ: AMSWA) today reported preliminary financial results for the first quarter of fiscal year 2023. a Traverse City, Michigan based innovator of supply chain networkdesign software. million and purchased Starboard Solutions Corp., a supply chain network optimization solution for approximately $6.5
Gartner analyst Paul Lord has developed a framework to better understand inventory trade-offs by categorizing those decisions according to the objectives they are meant to achieve: structural, operational and situational. Many companies struggle with decisions such as “How many days of sales or inventory turns per year should we target?
Through digital marketing, small brands are cropping up all over, and it is sentiment analysis and digital content driving purchases. Instead, companies need to build it into digital process redefinition like digital path-to-purchase, digital procurement, digital agriculture, digital manufacturing or digital service.
If we look back at history, 70% of companies implemented Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI), however two-decades later only 1% of companies use VMI processes to drive a better demand signal. ” At the other end of the continuum is the argument that “ Forecast error is the most important metric to improve.”
Jassy called generative AI a “once-in-a-lifetime” technology that will change the way the company operates, and said Amazon is already using it in “virtually every corner of the company,” calling out the supply chain areas of inventory and demand planning as examples. prediction made in March.
In the period of 2005-2010 I created research on the topic of demand-driven value networks as an analyst at AMR Research. This ended when Gartner purchased AMR Research in 2010. Since I do not believe in the Gartner business model, I left. 2) Build an outside-in demand planning model to use channel data. Reflections.
Conversely, just 8% of businesses with less capable supply chains report above-average growth. 1) In many businesses, the supply chain has never been subject to a design process, but has instead just … evolved. Pioneered the use of vendor-managed inventory. Supply Chain NetworkDesign.
Truck drivers report that maintenance issues are a constant nightmare. Manufacturers build “control towers” but there is no network dial tone between parties to enable prescriptive analytics and alerts.). There is not a one-to-one relationship between a container and a purchase order. What Should Be Done.
The SAP acquisition of Ariba slowed innovation and the purchase, and then the failed promise of investment in Crossgate was disappointing to SAP supply chain business users. Can these approaches be rolled up to design and implement a network of networks? Future of Analytics in the Building of Supply Chain 2030.
Diverse Skill Set Utilization: Multifaceted Role: Supply chain roles often require a blend of analytical, organizational, communication, and problem-solving skills. This can be engaging and fulfilling for those who enjoy using their analytical and strategic thinking skills.
The need to transport parts also drives inventory up, creates a need for space to store those parts, and uses energy for more forklift time and warehouse heating. Rather, going beyond customer expectations needs to be fully understood, and transportation strategies then developed to meet those expectations with optimal inventory levels.
If there’s any piece of technology or analytics that can help with the most advanced data-driven decision-making in the supply chain right now, that’s prescriptive analytics. It is the most promising form of analytics in the market currently. What Is Prescriptive Analytics in Supply Chain?
Inventory tends to be a very visible supply chain cost to senior management. How much inventory a company has is listed right there as a current asset on the balance sheet. A system-wide, multi-echelon approach to inventory optimization is the way to go. Read More: eBook: The Inventory Optimization Handbook ).
Omnichannel operations have become a business imperative because consumers are increasingly using the digital path to purchase. individuals over the age of 15 at some point use e-commerce platforms to make purchases, asserts Business Insider. ” Networkdesign. ” Networkdesign.
Supply chain planning systems receive the forecast as input and plans the purchasing of materials, making of products, and overall operation of your supply chain. The system helps you improve availability, reduce costs, and manage your network of manufacturing facilities and sales channels to hit ever-increasing profit targets.
It pains me to see nine out of ten companies are stuck at the critical intersection of cost and inventory turns. As a result, costs and waste abound. Customer sentiment technologies mine the patterns of unstructured text and use new forms of analytics to guide discovery on what matters to the customer. Bio-engineering?
The three courses in the new program, currently referred to as CTL.SC1x, CTL.SC2x, and CTL.SC3x, will each be between 10 to 12 weeks in length, and designed to be taken in sequence, as follows. The main topic areas are: Demand Forecasting, Planning, and Management, Inventory Planning, Management, and Control, and. Risk and resilience.
Anyway, the access to this database costs an arm and a leg. Therefore, the challenge to establish the ranking method is to find a more economical data source and the unbiased metrics. Ranking of Supply Chain Books We're sure some of you've been using Google Scholar to find related publications. The links below are #paid links.
NetworkDesign Today’s supply chain networks optimize for linear material flows. Capturing value after the initial use is not generally part of the process and processes are not designed for reverse logistics in many cases. The right rebate or trade-in program can encourage additional purchases.
In our most recent Supply Chain Matters This Week in Supply Chain Tech column , we highlighted the announcement from supply chain technology provider Logility , a wholly owned subsidiary of American Software , regarding this provider’s completion of the acquisition of supply chain networkdesign technology provider Starboard Solutions.
The Home Depot story above highlights an aspect of supply chain inventory optimization to drive business growth. SCM includes the movement and storage of raw materials, work-in-process inventory, and finished goods. Not to mention, the plethora of options and flexibility to make purchases, anytime anywhere. Sounds simple?
All of the above (and other down-stream KPIs and processes) are heavily influenced by the accuracy of a demand forecast: if the demand forecast is much more accurate, a company is more likely to have the right product, in the right quantities in inventory and will have less of the products in inventory that is not required.
The Bullwhip effect refers to the ripple effect of small changes at the consumer end of the supply chain create progressively larger swings in inventory as you move up the supply chain. Inventory Management – Gone are the days of “just in case” inventory. Everyone’s working from the same playbook.
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