Retail Supply Synchronization
Retailers depend upon accurate, predictable availability of supply. Without visibility and effective coordination of the inbound supply chain, retailers face inventory imbalances, variable inbound lead times, frequent stock-outs and lower customer order fill rates. Increased outsourcing, varying supplier types, logistics networks and globalization have only added to the complexity and variability. While traditional solutions focus on planning and procurement, they do little to monitor and coordinate inbound purchase order and logistics execution where the greatest number of exceptions occurs that disrupt supply.
Yantra's Supply Synchronization solution is focused on providing the in-transit visibility and supply coordination necessary to ensure supply is synchronized with customer demand. Retailers will gain rapid-response capabilities for managing short lifecycle product environments and minimizing investments in buffer stocks due to poor predictability.
Yantra's Supply Synchronization solution improves operational performance by proactively coordinating the fulfillment of purchase requirements across an extended supplier network. It provides visibility and event-based management to the inbound process - monitoring and controlling activities and information flows among buyers, suppliers, logistics providers and partners. It enables greater accuracy through communication / collaboration with manufacturers' suppliers (via EDI, XML, portals, etc.), and extends the capabilities of existing systems to provide connectivity to even the smallest suppliers to increase overall predictability and performance.
Key advantages include:
- Procurement lifecycle coordination - rules-based management of all purchase order related activity, inventory, shipments, exceptions, settlement, returns
- Deep supply visibility - monitor and track all supply types at all locations including stores, such as forecasted, scheduled, purchased, shipped, in-transit, etc.
- Event management and exception resolution - proactive and reactive alerting and rules-based resolution for managing unplanned problems and delays
- Aggregation and collaboration - aggregate POs, schedules, forecasts from multiple systems and broker / communicate to suppliers and enable collaboration to ensure accuracy
With greater visibility to inbound supply and the activities of suppliers and logistics carriers, retailers can gain significant predictability and reduce investments in on-hand inventory due to current levels of variability. Most importantly, with greater predictability and visibility, retailers can better synchronize their supply with customer demand, and can identify potential shortages / overages before they happen and take corrective action. Retailers with assortments that include limited allocation, fashion, or time-sensitive high-value merchandise can use Supply Synchronization to protect against lost sales or end-of-season margin erosion.
