Unleash the Power of Cloud to Accelerate Growth and Build Resilience

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Unleash the Power of Cloud to Accelerate Growth and Build Resilience

3 minute de lecture

The concept of a supply chain was born out of the creation of the assembly line, dating back to the early 20th century. Each function, from planning to delivery, had its place. And if everyone did their part, just like a well-oiled machine, manufacturers could expect high margins and growth. It worked so well that as manufacturers modernized supply chain management, introducing technology and automation to help them move faster and smarter. But the foundation of supply chain was still tied to the original linear, siloed, rigid approach of early mass production.

The problem is that today’s world looks pretty different than the business landscape of 1905 — or even 2015. Optimizing at the functional level, with a focus on achieving the lowest cost, will no longer produce the best possible results for the organization. Walled-off systems can no longer handle the pace of change — or deliver the agility necessary to keep up with customer demand shifts, market disruptions and growing supply chain complexity.

Businesses leaders across industries know they need a new approach. They want a supply chain that’s modern, resilient and fully optimized to deliver the greatest possible profit to their organizations. Who wouldn’t?

The challenge is, where do you start? This blog post will walk you through the key steps you should take to increase supply chain resilience and profitability — by shifting to the cloud and taking full advantage of the technology innovation available today.


Step 1: Use the cloud as a launchpad for digital transformation

Enterprises today want a supply chain that’s modern, resilient and fully optimized. To get there, they must first make a leap over to the cloud. By shifting from on-premises computing resources to the cloud, businesses can achieve a significantly higher level of agility and speed, which enables them to pivot and shift on the fly in response to supply chain disruptions.

Businesses also gain the ability to consume innovation faster and cheaper. With on- premises technology stacks, it’s time-consuming and expensive to upgrade to new functionality. But on the cloud, this can be done in minutes or days, versus months or years. And finally, companies are able to process information — running scenarios across merchandising, manufacturing, logistics, warehousing and distribution all at the same time, with unconstrained computing power. They can scale up and scale down quickly, on-demand. Rather than using one CPU for 100 hours, companies can use 100 CPUs for one hour, compressing planning time from days to minutes. They’re no longer constrained by long batch cycles, and they can finally put their investments in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to better use.

This speed and agility in decision-making will be a pivotal aspect in determining supply chain winners and losers in the years ahead. Those organizations that can spin up a new scenario based on real-time market factors, and execute on that scenario in minutes, will gain a competitive edge.

While cloud gets talked about a lot in supply chain, the concept of cloud computing has still struggled to really get traction for a handful of reasons — most notably integration and data challenges. This brings us to Step 2.

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Step 2: Get Your data together


When data is siloed — and especially when it’s on-premises and all over the place — that’s a huge obstacle to digital transformation. Scattered data makes it both expensive and challenging to get visibility across the entire supply chain. To move quickly, it’s imperative to understand how all the moving pieces of a supply chain interplay. When companies make a capacity plan, they need to see how it aligns with the demand forecast, the supply network and even warehouse staffing. It needs to all match up, or else supply chains are stuck in a constant back-and-forth battle, which wastes time and erodes profits.

Beyond hindering visibility, fragmented data also results in fragmented or conflicting reports, analytics and insights. Point solutions and KPIs should not be competing against each other. The key is bringing all supply chain data together, creating a single source of truth for applications and analytics. Bringing all insights onto a centralized data cloud removes the need for ETL (extract, transform and load) processes, mitigates the proliferation of integrations, and dramatically reduces costs of testing and ongoing maintenance. By standardizing the data model, all insights can be leveraged across any application, for all analytics and AI — including new solutions that will be added in the future. That brings us to Step 3.

Step 3: Design a digital transformation that’s aligned to business goals


Monolithic applications can take years to implement, as well as years to earn a return on investment. Companies lose focus along the way. If the business model changes to reflect the ever-evolving market landscape, the solution may not even work anymore.

Every business is at a different level of digital maturity. Some have already moved to a software-as-a-service (SaaS) model and adopted new technologies. Some are running on older, on-premises applications. And still others have a mix of both. It doesn’t make sense — financially, technically or in terms of change management — to put every company on the same digital transformation path. Instead, a company-specific game plan enables businesses to consume technology and innovation at their own pace. At Blue Yonder, we’ve found that’s key to an accelerated time to value, a higher return on investment and longer-term success.

Composable microservices bring together specific sets of capabilities that deliver discrete sets of business value to solve specific supply chain needs. They allow organizations to break down behemoth implementations into smaller projects that can get up and running in months. This allows organizations to consume innovations that address today’s pain points right away, without waiting for other ancillary capabilities to be deployed. There are no more “cliff” events. Instead, incremental business benefits are delivered along the way.

An important note: “Best of breed” may not necessarily mean “best for you.” Fragmented solutions can perpetuate siloes. And, while data integrations can mask supply chain issues, they don’t solve them. Ideally, companies should aim to acquire composable applications that all sit on the same platform and work synchronously together.

Step 4: Capture the full value of data and AI


At this point, the supply chain is on the cloud. Check. Data is consolidated onto a single data cloud, with a single data model. Check. And the latest functionalities and technology innovations have been adopted. Check. 
Now it’s time to capitalize on the full value of data and AI. Companies should look for ways to automate — and optimize — existing processes, leveraging the power of AI and ML. For example, Blue Yonder offers the ability to mix and match ML algorithms and AI to optimize forecast accuracy. For example, a customer could use two statistical models for certain SKUs and AI for more complex forecasting challenges like fast-moving goods. Blue Yonder also helps customers integrate their own homegrown models.

By adopting Blue Yonder’s latest AI and ML, businesses realize many benefits, including an improvement in forecast accuracy, higher fill rates and optimized capacity utilization. These operational improvements drive recurring benefits in terms of greater revenue, improved gross margin and operating expense reductions. There are also one-time benefits associated with reduction and CAPEX avoidance. 
 

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Your next move: Crush your business case  

No CFO is willing to wait years for a return on investment. That’s why Blue Yonder partners closely with our customers to define and achieve real value. First, we sit down for a multi-day workshop which ends with a high-level impact and opportunity assessment. Next, we perform a detailed four- to six-week assessment that identifies pain points and opportunities, an optimal technology architecture, a sequenced roadmap and a robust business case. 
Blue Yonder also provides a change management plan. There will be a lot of shifts in not just people’s roles, but also what they do day-to-day.  In partnership with our customers, Blue Yonder drives value creation. On average, Blue Yonder customers can achieve a 12X return on their investment. 

The time to act is now. For those organizations who make the leap to the cloud, unify their data and capture the full value of AI, there is an enormous opportunity for growth. Those companies who wait risk losing their competitive edge. While no one can predict the next big market change or disruption, it’s imperative to react with speed and agility when it occurs.

The world is evolving, and supply chains need to evolve along with it. By moving to the cloud, you’ll be well on your way. Are you ready to start your journey to greater supply chain resilience? Watch our on-demand webinar or contact Blue Yonder today.
 

Libérez la puissance de l'informatique en nuage : Accélérer la croissance, renforcer la résilience, multiplier la valeur par 12

Join Blue Yonder and Acceleration Economy to dive into the transformative power of the cloud—a timely move that unlocks the true potential of end-to-end supply chain orchestration and maximizes the value of your technology investments.

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