Big Data as an accelerator for making decisions

The morning evaluation in the Warehouse Management System predicts that there will be a material bottleneck this week and calls for action. HomeRob Corp. had started a major sales campaign last week and Louise simulated the anticipated effects of the sales with her analytics software and ordered material. Since the campaign results were much better than expected, the planned quantities are not sufficient.

Now the question must be answered as to how to deal with the high demand. Louise has the Digital Factory Management (DFM) system simulate production in the coming weeks and finds that the delivery times assigned to the customers are very long, and they are already dissatisfied because shorter delivery times were advertised. It now lets the DFM simulate what is possible when all of the parts are procured. The result is satisfactory. She then checks in her supply chain system which suppliers will deliver the missing parts when and at what prices.

On the way to the sales and operations (S&OP) meeting she meets Christine and explains the two options to her: Either long delivery times or increased manufacturing costs.  Christine is not satisfied and asks how manufacturing can be achieved more cost-effectively in the future. Louise explains the concept of the Supply Chain Event Management System, which she wants to pilot as an initial step for very important components. In order to achieve this, a double-source principle is to be introduced, where suppliers are also located on other continents. This minimizes risks and lowers costs.

The participants of the S&OP meeting thank Louise for her work. Once again, everyone is happy that they managed to link the suppliers to their system and network the entire supply chain. This leads to visibility in the supply chain, without which such decisions would not be feasible. Based on the facts, the team decides to procure the materials in order to shorten the delivery times. Louise implements the measures immediately and the suppliers automatically receive a corresponding message.  The customers receive a new delivery date and are satisfied.