Fall 2012 Tech Preview Guide
We operate in a world where change is a given. And while change may not always be welcome, it is almost always necessary in order to remain relevant with whomever you are trying to please. In this industry, consumer goods (CG) companies must continually change and refine their business strategies to keep up with customer and consumer demands. And that means that technology companies must, in turn, continually evolve their products to help the CG companies keep up. That’s why, twice a year, CGT publishes a Tech Preview Guide. This Fall edition will introduce you to nine new solutions that can help you change your company for the better.SAP Sales & Operations Planning
SAP • Launched: May 2012Filling a Need: Aligns and optimizes demand and supply plans along with financial goals via context-centric visibility and consistent metrics across business functions to satisfy future demand profitably.
Unique Features: SAP Sales & Operations Planning, powered by the SAP HANATM Platform, combines demand and supply planning across business functions along with finance and financial modeling in one seamless solution. The solution supports contextual social collaboration across all stakeholder teams throughout the planning process and enables real-time simulation and scenario planning to quickly align varying views of demand and supply plans into a single, unified forecast.
Key Users: The SAP solution enables effective forecasting from an executive, strategic level to a tactical level across business functions, including supply chain, sales, marketing, finance and more.
Expected Benefits: Improves forecast accuracy to mitigate supply risk, optimizes inventory levels to lower carrying costs, and ensures on-shelf availability to eliminate risk of last sales.
Want more info? Download more information about SAP S&OP.
SCAplanner™
SCA Technologies • Launched: November 2012Filling a Need: SCA offers solutions for companies who need to reduce the impact of volatility across demand, capacity, and commodity cost fluctuations associated with direct materials.
Unique Features: Managing your sourcing costs, budgets, pricing and potential risk is challenging. SCA Technologies, a leading provider of cost management solutions, can provide the strategic advantage you need.
SCAplanner™ is a web-based enterprise suite of software that provides a collaborative process to plan, track and optimize cost of goods and prices. The solution enables up-to-date forecasts, planning and cost optimization to manage market and supply variances of high-value strategic items.
Unlike traditional planning methods that can be slow, complex and compartmentalized, the solution allows companies to anticipate enterprise costs and margins, respond with optimal operational decisions, adjust pricing in faster cycles and orchestrate alternatives to capture business benefits.
Key Users: SCAplanner™ is used by individuals Supply Chain (Procurement & Commodity Councils), Finance (Risk Management) and Corporate Social Responsibility (Supplier Development & Sourcing).
Expected Benefits: SCA helps companies orchestrate operational alternatives for their value network decisions that enable them to reduce cost of goods sold by 3 to 5 percent annually.
Want to know more? Download more info about SCAplanner™.
Potential To Sell (PTS)
Shiloh Technologies • Launched: December 2012Filling a Need: PTS identifies the greatest estimated lost sales by item and store through analysis of probable root causes. This is actionable information that could positively impact suppliers’ sales.
Unique Features: PTS provides actionable information via reporting and analysis features that identify the store/item combinations that are falling below pre-calculated sales over a user-specified time period. PTS uses sophisticated algorithms encompassing a multitude of factors that could cause lost sales, yet remains simple and repeatable for the user.
Key Users: PTS has an incredible breadth of use across all supplier departments. Identifying lost sales, on-shelf availability and additional sales opportunities has the potential to impact all areas involving sales analysis, replenishment, forecasting, ordering, promotions, retail execution and category management.
Expected Benefits: PTS will reveal hidden opportunities and estimated lost sales by item/store so resources can focus on the most impactful areas first, increasing ROI. When execution exceptions are corrected, sales usually increase. By knowing the true potential of an item, you can forecast and realize true financial opportunities in many other processes.
Want to know more? Download more info about Potential to Sell.
Sopheon Accolade Version 8.0
Sopheon • Launched: April 2012Filling a Need: Helps companies improve innovation results by increasing their innovation success rate, accelerating their response to changing consumer demands, and focusing their resources on high-value innovations.
Unique Features: End-to-end solution for the entire CG innovation lifecycle, including strategic product planning, ideation, concept development, and innovation process execution (including Stage-Gate and beyond); powerful scenario-based optimization improves portfolio prioritization and selection; integration of consumer research into the front-end of innovation, increasing the value of new ideas and concepts; embedded best practices that reflect over 10 years of leadership in CG innovation.
Key Users: Accolade supports the daily innovation work of cross-functional business people. This includes all team members that participate in the innovation process, including marketing, R&D, operations, supply chain, quality, finance, and sales; and all business leaders that make investment decisions for innovation.
Expected Benefits: Increase revenues and profits from new products by as much as 40 to 60 percent; increase the value of portfolio by 75 to 100 percent; improve product success rates by 15 percent or more; and reduce time-to-market by up to 30 percent, speeding your response to changing consumer needs.
EcodEX
Selerant • Launched: July 2012Filling a Need: Create a comprehensive approach to sustainable product development from concept through development and launch to the end of the product application.
Unique Features: EcodEX elevates visibility of sustainable assessment throughout every stage of the product lifecycle (such as carbon footprint, water use, energy use, land use, etc.).
Key Users: EcodEX was developed for Sustainability departments; however, even non-experts can see and understand actionable results to significantly increase the product’s sustainability.
Expected Benefits: The Sustainability Consortium (sustainabilityconsortium.org) has cited that a comprehensive solution from concept to market and final use is essential for a truly sustainable product. These concepts have allowed Selerant customers to reduce their carbon footprint and dramatically reduce the environment impacts.
Vistaar SmartTrade
Vistaar Technologies, Inc. • Launched: 2012Filling a Need: Consumer goods companies need to deliver the right products into the market, with a proposition that works for each customer and that delivers growth and profitability expectations to the manufacturer. This requires a winning approach across all key revenue drivers – with pricing and promotions being very critical. Vistaar SmartTrade enables both pricing and promotions to function as an integrated commercial strategy.
Unique Features: SmartTrade is built on a powerful technology platform that integrates all aspects of price promotion strategy, execution and performance management. Powered by a comprehensive data model that includes both internal and external data sources, it has workflow capabilities to manage coordination across the company and provides system guidance with alerts and recommendations to manage planning and negotiations with customers.
Expected Benefits: Vistaar price management solutions have been launched in many industries. Most customers realize 1 to 3 points in increased margin and sustained revenue along with increased productivity in the price planning processes.
Want to know more? Download more info about Vistaar SmartTrade.
Stratum 6.1 Business Intelligence
Silvon Software Inc. • Launched: February 2012Filling a Need: Stratum was designed to help CPG businesses glean valuable insights from sales and operations data via quick-to-deploy analytics and reports that highlight key performance metrics.
Unique Features: Stratum integrates information from ERP, CRM, SCM, POS, etc. into a single business analysis and reporting platform. The application’s packaged analytics provide decision makers with cross-enterprise visibility to sales and operations performance. The most recent release integrates seamlessly with Microsoft Excel and other Office applications, providing additional options for delivering performance data easily to internal users and external parties with whom the enterprise may wish to collaborate.
Key Users: A cross-enterprise BI application used by analysts, demand planners, sales and operations personnel and line-of-business executives.
Expected Benefits: Stratum gives CPG decision makers the insight needed to better understand sales trends, demand patterns and trade promotion effectiveness, and drive improvements in inventory, supplier and production performance.
Want more info? Download the Silvon Stratum for CPG brochure.
Data Management Services
1WorldSync • Launched: September 2012Filling a Need: Consumers rely heavily on mobile applications and web sites to get information about products. But where does this information come from? Is it accurate? Typically, web and mobile application providers scour the web sites of retailers and downstream customers to get product information. And these customers get information from manufacturers, either through paper forms, or, preferably, through the Global Data Synchronization Network™ (GDSN®). What the system lacks is consistency and a single version of product truth.
Unique Features: 1WorldSync Data Management Services provide the platform for manufacturers and downstream customers to manage and synchronize product information through the GDSN. 1WorldSync works with 15,000+ customers in 50+ countries. It provides a robust data pool application and a full suite of product data governance services.
Key Users: Manufacturers who need to take control of product information. 1WorldSync Data Management Services can help them establish and distribute a single version of product truth that is used both internally and for their customers.
Expected Benefits: With unparalleled knowledge of best practices in Product Data Management, 1WorldSync enables companies of all sizes to source, cleanse, maintain and exchange product information with trading partners. It also provides the connections for companies to collaborate and communicate product data among a rapidly growing global network of companies, large and small, in many industries.
Want more info? Contact 1WorldSync at +1-866-280-4013
Quofore Mojo
Quofore (AFS Technologies) • Launched: October 2012Filling a Need: Mojo lets your field sales representative choose their device — iPhone, Android, etc. — and have mobile applications at their fingertips for field sales, merchandising, DSD, in-store marketing, van sales and more.
Unique Features: Mojo leverages the power of mobility, the interoperability of Cloud Computing, and the benefits of Software as a Service (SaaS) to deploy retail execution solutions quickly and cost effectively without the need for dedicated infrastructure.
Key Users: Field sales force, drivers, sales and marketing, corporate planners
Expected Benefits: Mojo is designed to help consumer products companies compete more effectively in the field and allow them to quickly capture advantage in new and emerging markets. The solution’s highly configurable multi-tenant architecture allows multi-national and multi-divisional companies to roll out multiple, localized implementations in much less time and at a lower cost.