Analytics Concepts
COVID-19 proved to be the ultimate stress test for day-to-day operations across all industries. Global market leaders were forced to rethink and transform their supply chain models to meet the evolving needs of consumers while also working to maintain resilience in the face of near constant business interruptions.
However, along the disruptions of the past year came an opportunity for organisations to reconsider how they use and apply data across their operations. Supply Chain Dive reports that after the pandemic, over 66% of businesses have shown a renewed interest in investing in new technologies.
Heightened globalisation, economic uncertainty and faster product life cycles have all contributed to today’s supply chains being significantly more complex to manage. However, by utilising analytics as well as an optimised trade management solution, business leaders can access critical risk-related insights and additional information for better decision making.
Achieving a comprehensive approach to risk management
As businesses continue on the path to recovery, data and analytics will play a key part in promoting the visibility leaders need to better understand their exposures and create proactive risk management strategies.
There are several ways data analytics can help to improve overall efficiency across the supply chain. As Construction Business News explains, the technology offers leaders several capabilities, including data validation, detecting anomalies, benchmarking, mobile reporting and real-time visibility into global logistics.
Having the flexibility to adjust operations to supplier performance is an essential component of managing today’s complex logistics environment. By utilising analytic forecasting, businesses can ensure that in-market sourcing groups are diversified to reduce dependence on a single partner.
The events of the past year only further illustrated the potential domino effect the closure of a single facility or port could have on the entire supply chain — with the ability to create and test “what-if scenarios,” managers can source accordingly to prevent another major failure across international partnerships.
Managing cash flow
Agility is critical in today’s complex supply chain environment, especially considering the high volume of exceptions that leaders must address in the freight management space. However, when planning and decisions are reliant on static data, cash flow becomes tied up in excess inventory, expedited shipping costs and long lead times, explains PYMNTS.
In addition to optimising the management of sourcing and workflow, data analytics can be applied throughout operations to promote efficiencies across an organisation’s payments, minimising friction in the cash-to-cash cycle.
A company’s procurement department can utilise AI to look for opportunities to improve lead times, factor in discounting and ensure the best pricing, explains Supply Chain Dive. These insights are invaluable when it comes time to arrange and review contracts with partners.
Using this tech-driven approach, a company can add further value by investing in other areas of the company, including looking toward opportunities to innovate through product variations and potential new customer segmentations.
The quality of data and the insights it drives will be a critical component of optimising cash flows. However, many organisations quickly become overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information with which they are working. By applying cloud-enabled technology and advanced analytics, leaders can more strategically leverage data to foster more valuable partnerships across their supply chain, leading to improved payment flows.
A need for enhanced data control
Increasingly, data is being sourced from multiple business activities as well as from external parties. Now more than ever before, it’s essential for supply chain leaders to establish clear visibility and a strong control of the flow of information across day-to-day processes.
For many leaders, the most significant challenge to capturing the advantages data analytics has to offer, is internally creating the complex systems needed to integrate and support these functions.
At BSM Global, we offer small- to medium, large and multinational enterprises an optimised trade management software, with capabilities including holistic product and profile management as well as data-driven logistics planning and reporting. By deploying our solutions, your company will be able to refine its global trade and system processes, overcoming many of the highly disruptive business challenges emerging across the industry.
From simplifying the digital exchange of critical data between you and your partners to managing complex regulatory certificates and compliance records, our cloud-enabled software offers a wide array of solutions for even the most complex processes within the industry.
If you’re interested in discovering new ways to improve your organisation’s own supply chain or have additional questions on the application of cloud-based technologies, contact us today.