2010 Readers' Choice: Supply Chain Execution
Practice Director at IDC Manufacturing Insights, Kimberly Knickle, believes that the best way to sum up the relative overlap between 2009 and 2010's results is to say that IT buyers stuck with existing vendors and investments for the most part to minimize expenses in their IT budgets.CGT: How has the economic downturn impacted SCE initiatives?
Knickle: There has been a negative impact on supply chain application investments, primarily with companies taking much longer to make decisions about investments. Investments that did take place were justified by expectations for clear cost savings or efficiency improvements. As a process, supply chain execution is still improving.
CGT: What SCE trends will impact the consumer goods industry?
Knickle: One trend that's hard to miss is the increase of supply chain outsourcing. In this case, a big impact is going to be related to managing the added complexity from having more logistics and distribution options. The mixed approach to managing the supply chain ups the complexity of the process. It's also worth noting a couple macro trends that will test the supply chain, including sustainability, whether it's regulatory-driven or not, and the globalization/localization trend.
CGT: How have SCE processes and the supporting technologies delivered on cost savings and sustainability promises made by CG companies?
Knickle: An IT investment isn't a solution until it works! So if you're asking if SCE tools have been able to deliver cost savings and sustainability improvements over the last few years, the answer is definitely yes, by consolidating loads, better route planning, and basically optimizing supply chain assets. A more interesting question is -- can SCE tools do better? The answer is also yes. And given the fact that CG companies are still promising their customers that they can achieve even more cost savings and green improvements, there's more work to be done. We'd like to be able to assign sustainability "costs" to individual customers, orders, product lines, products and more. And SCE applications are going to be a big part of the solution.
"Providing our customers with accurate, timely shipment information is vital. Using On-Demand TMS, we know the status of our shipments, and our customers receive delivery performance reporting for all their locations."
-- VP, Supply Chain Services, Barilla (Source: LeanLogistics.com Case Study, 2009)
SMB MARKET: ORACLE
"Six months after implementing Oracle Real Time Sales & Operations Planning, we have seen a dramatic increase in forecast accuracy. This resulted in an immediate 20 percent inventory reduction."
-- Wendy Malloy, Inventory Planning Manager, Wilton