Supply chain management has experienced a radical transformation in recent years. It now requires companies to rethink the ways they plan production, manufacture and deliver products and handle returns. The basis of Unified Supply Chain Management lies in collecting and analyzing data and extracting the right insights. Those insights help organizations work faster, more flexibly, more accurately and more efficiently.
In the past, supply chain management was primarily a job for logistics departments supporting their company’s sales and production teams. But today, companies are under growing pressure to work more efficiently, lower costs and respond transparently to rapidly changing customer expectations. As a result, companies are shifting their focus to optimal planning and connecting supply chain partners. This means that supply chain management requires a concerted effort from many different parts of the organization. Unified Supply Chain presents a viable option for building the supply chain of today and tomorrow.
What is Unified Supply Chain?
With Unified Supply Chain, you no longer treat the individual parts of the chain as separate entities, but rather take a bird’s-eye view in which they are all indispensable parts of a whole. At the same time, you have access to real-time data from across the entire playing field of processes. This enables you to align your supply chain’s planning as closely as possible with sourcing, manufacturing, delivery and returns. The sum of the parts adds up to a clearer view of the entire chain.
Goals of Unified Supply Chain
When managing the flow of goods and services, it’s important to focus on these five goals:
- Streamlining supply-side activities
- Maximizing value
- Increasing operational efficiency
- Controlling and reducing costs
- Being able to predict and respond to the demand side
Unified Supply Chain solutions ultimately help your organization become fast, flexible, more granular, accurate and efficient.
Data insights
The key to any Unified Supply Chain solution is the ability to collect and analyze datasets and arrive at the right insights. It takes a smart approach to handling your data to properly align the different parts of your supply chain. If you optimize spend management and buy fewer products, you still need to be able to deliver the right products. If you overproduce, your products remain on the shelves, and you’ll be stuck with higher costs for warehousing merchandise that may never sell.
We take the insights gained through Unified Supply Chain and help you adjust your organization’s activities, taking into account your people, technology and processes. By optimizing processes, providing training and reviewing your organization’s structure, we help you become more agile. As a result, your supply chain is in a much better position to respond to current and future conditions.
Responding to future demand
We analyze data and gain insights to improve the following areas of your business:
- Global spend management
- Supply chain optimization
- Effective maintenance
- Predictive models (finance, forecast, TCO)
- Compliance
In global spend management, for example, we look at where your parts are located and how you will need to organize your procurement so that you will be able to produce. This is also related to your production itself (planning, producing, delivering, returning and sourcing raw materials).
Predictive models are essential for determining what you make and deliver when. Analyzing historical trends in your data lets you anticipate future demand, so you can maintain an active rather than a reactive position.
