Supply chain needs pros

CONCERNED by the lack of supply chain management professionals in the country, 2GO of the Aboitiz Transport System Group encouraged youth leaders to embark on a “unique” career in the supply chain business.

Belle Pacetes, 2GO training manager, revealed during the Third Aboitiz-organized Future Leaders Business Summit last Friday that the company has observed a “wide gap” in the supply chain industry caused by the lack of professionals in the business.

“There is, currently, no formal training or education (to produce) professionals. Most practitioners in the supply chain industry (acquired) their expertise from experience, training, simply being on the job (and) learning the ropes,” she said.

2GO is the supply chain solutions provider under the Aboitiz Transport System (ATS), the transport and logistics company of Aboitiz and Co. (ACO) that is owned by publicly-listed Aboitiz Equity Ventures (AEV). From the release of the goods from the manufacturer to the delivery of the products to customers nationwide, 2GO’s supply chain services include warehousing, order entry and releasing, transport planning and routing, delivery to customers nationwide, and document management, among others.

To address the high demand and help the youth develop core competencies required for the job, 2GO launched a supply chain management course with the Jose Rizal University (JRU), De la Salle College of St. Benilde (DLSU-CSB), Technological Institute of the Philippines (TIP) and the Society of Fellows in Supply Management (SOFSM).

Scholarships

2GO recently granted 15 full four-year scholarships in JRU that now offers Bachelor of Commercial Science major in Supply Management, focusing on sourcing and procurement, manning and replenishment, logistics operations, and customer service.

DLSU-CSB and TIP will offer a similar course as post-graduate studies to be launched this year.

Pacetes explained that these courses can be taken as a certificate course to be completed in two years or a full degree completed in four years.

2GO is also planning to partner with local higher education institutions, such as the University of San Carlos in Cebu City.

“Our mission is to help our customers and our country gain competitive advantage through reduced overall cost by eliminating processes and layers or middlemen,” said Pacetes.

She said that by diversifying its product offerings and getting into the supply chain business, 2GO has been able to weather the negative effects of rising fuel prices. (NRC)
Source-sunstar.com.ph

PathGuide Technologies Recognized for Innovation by Supply & Demand Chain Executive

PathGuide Technologies, a leading provider of warehouse management systems (WMS) for wholesale and industrial distributors, today announced that the company has been included on the Supply & Demand Chain Executive annual '100' list of supply chain solution providers, consultants and other organizations that help lead the way in transforming companies' supply and demand chains.

The special focus of this year's '100' was supply chain innovation.

'We're delighted to receive this recognition from Supply & Demand Chain Executive,' said Eric Allais, president and CEO of PathGuide Technologies. 'Delivering warehouse management solutions that meet each customer's unique distribution requirements, and wrapping those solutions in the industry's best dedicated service and support is our core focus. It's a pleasure to be part of the annual ‘100' ranking.'

Supply & Demand Chain Executive has identified leading providers of supply chain services and technologies who are at the forefront of innovation. Based on submissions to the '100' from end users and solution providers, the judging committee for the '100,' including editorial staff of the magazine, in conjunction with the editorial advisory board, has compiled a list of leading supply and demand chain innovators.

'Our goal with this year's ‘100' is to highlight a broad range of solutions and services targeted at a variety of industries, addressing the needs of companies of varying sizes and assisting in the transformation of a diverse mix of the functions that make up the supply chain,' explained Andrew K. Reese, editor of Supply & Demand Chain Executive. 'Therefore, our judging committee looked for solutions across a variety of industries, addressing the needs of companies of varying sizes, and assisting in the transformation of a diverse mix of the functions that make up the supply chain.'

Final recipients are featured in the cover story of the June/July issue of Supply & Demand Chain Executive, and can be found online at www.SDCExec.com/SDCE100.

About Supply & Demand Chain Executive
Supply & Demand Chain Executive is the executive's user manual for successful supply and demand chain transformation, utilizing hard-hitting analysis, viewpoints and unbiased case studies to steer executives and supply management professionals through the complicated, yet critical, world of supply and demand chain enablement to gain competitive advantage.

About PathGuide Technologies
PathGuide Technologies, Inc., a privately held company founded in 1989, is a leading provider of WMS solutions for wholesale and industrial distributors across North America. PathGuide's software and services help suppliers increase productivity and order accuracy, improve customer service and lower labor costs, ultimately driving greater profitability. To learn how distributors of all sizes can benefit from improved warehouse management, visit www.pathguide.com.
Source-pr-inside.com

Cardinal Health steps in as Prime Therapeutics’ primary supplier

Cardinal Health Inc. has taken over as the primary pharmaceutical supplier for a Minnesota company that serves nearly 15 million people nationwide.

Dublin-based Cardinal said it struck a three-year deal with Prime Therapeutics, a St. Paul-based pharmacy benefits manager. Through the deal, terms for which the companies didn’t disclose, Cardinal will be primarily supplying two Prime facilities in Irving, Texas, and Albuquerque, N.M., that serve the company’s mail-order consumers.

Sheila Thelemann, a Prime spokeswoman, declined to dislose the name of the distributor it cut ties with, but said it made the switch to gain access to a wider range of generic pharmaceuticals and receive quicker delivery.

Prime provides pharmaceutical benefits for about 14.6 million people through Blue Cross and Blue Shield, employer, union and third-party plans. Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Ohio isn’t among Prime’s clients, Thelemann said.

Tara Schumacher, a Cardinal spokeswoman, said Prime is in line for additional supply-chain services as well. Details are still being finalized, but Schumacher said Cardinal often works with facilities such as Prime’s mail-order centers to streamline ordering and receiving processes.

“Once the medication gets through the door, we’re trying to remove as many steps as possible,” Schumacher said. “If they can be more efficient, they drive costs out.”

Cardinal Health (NYSE:CAH), the largest publicly traded corporation in the state, recorded a $1.9 billion profit on $86.9 billion in revenue in fiscal 2007 ended June 30. The company employs about 43,000 worldwide.

Prime employs about 1,600 and managed more than $8.2 billion in prescription drug spending last year. The company declined to disclose annual revenue.

Source-bizjournals.com

RedPrairie launches unified supply chain solution

RedPrarie has announced the release of its E2e Supply Chain Execution suite, which incorporates both RFID and automatic identification and data capture (AIDC) technologies in hopes of simplifying and unifying the supply chain process.

For the new release, RedPrairie has integrated the asset management capabilities of its stand-alone mobile resource management application into its E2e warehouse management module. The system can now support the use of RFID, two-dimensional bar codes and other AIDC technologies to track inventory and assets from distribution centers, throughout the transit process, at customer sites and within a retailer's store network.

Both serialized and non-serialized assets can be tracked at each location, and the system enables customers to track the condition and status of each asset, as well as its movement throughout the supply chain. This enables reusable assets such as freight containers to be tracked at the same time as their cargo, with the hopes of decreasing inefficiencies in the supply chain.

Other elements of the E2e Supply Chain Execution suite include transportation management and work force management. The platform is built on a service-oriented architecture framework enabling it to be operated remotely as well as run on a user's own network.
Source-rfidnews.org

Supply chain management software set to top the sales charts

Software industry experts are predicting that supply chain management software will generate a staggering £4 billion of sales by 2010, which would make it one of the world’s most widely bought global business specialist applications.

Supply chain management software has proved extremely popular over the last 30 years with businesses that operate in time and cost conscious production and distribution environments. As with most cutting-edge technologies, supply chain management software functionality has undergone exponential advances, especially in the last five years which have allowed it to keep pace with an ever-changing business world.

It is the adaptive nature of the software and its ability to drive successful businesses that will propel supply chain management software to the top of the software sales charts. At the outset, early systems focused purely on transactions, but it wasn’t until the recent advent of client server technology that supply chain management systems could be more easily understood and accepted by users.

Organisations are increasingly operating across a number of time zones on different continents, and as well as the geographical and cultural challenges faced, there is the added problem of multiple distribution channels. With greater emphasis placed on empowerment of users through access to information, supply chain executives have added pressure piled on them to ensure that they embrace globalisation, battle obsolescence and also to contain costs, in addition to their day job!

The trials and tribulations of supply chain executives make them aggressive when demanding improvements to software. They want something that can do all the above and make sure they can control inventory and suppliers, and supply chain management software companies are more than happy to oblige. They are quick to adopt new technologies in their quest for the perfect supply chain management software and have naturally embraced the web in their designs.

Indeed, the internet acts as a superb connectivity tool for supply chain management software. A whole suite of collaborative programs for the entire supply chain can be operated over the web, which impacts positively on forecasting and planning while providing a transparent view of the performance measures.

Today’s advanced systems can bring together a huge number of suppliers at the click of a mouse, using XML web services and trading portals, and have certainly come a long way from the primitive EDI systems of the 1970s. But, possibly the biggest difference between today’s successful supply chain management systems and their forerunners is the impact they have in helping workers make decisions.

That is the true value of any successful system, allowing the business to keep the supply chain in perfectly efficient working order while providing many opportunities to control increasingly diverse supplier relationships and inventory portfolios. For as long as there are companies operating in aggressively competitive markets, the future looks bright for sales of supply chain management software.

Disclaimer: Matthew Pressman writes for a wide variety of commercial clients. This article is intended for information purposes only and readers should seek additional information before taking any actions based on its content.

Source-bestsyndication.com

Where Does the U.S. Stand in the Global Market?

Customers and competitors alike used to be just a short drive away. All business was local. But the entire world has changed over the last twenty years thanks to globalization. The forest products industry is no stranger to this trend. What has taken place abroad, especially in Asia, has forever impacted the business landscape in North America. Although the furniture industry and some other large wood users have primarily moved offshore, there remain some bright spots for the future of America’s forest products industry.

Hakan Ekstrom, president of Wood Resources International LLC (WRI), agreed to discuss with the TimberLine recent developments in the global wood market. As a leading consultant and publisher of market reports, Ekstrom keeps tabs on international markets. His expertise includes on-site evaluations of forest resources, raw material flows (logs and wood chips), forest products trade, wood cost outlook (pulpwood prices and sawlog prices) and forest industry developments worldwide.

WRI has successfully completed more than 200 consulting assignments in over 35 countries. WRI publishes two quarterly timber price reports The North American Wood Fiber Review and the Wood Resource Quarterly.

Ekstrom talked about some of the most pressing issues facing the global forest products industry and shared a surprisingly optimistic view of America’s position in the market.

TimberLine: Russia has announced that it will impose stiff tariffs next year on exported logs in an effort to encourage more domestic production of finished wood products. How will this impact the global market given the vast forest reserves that Russia holds?

Ekstrom: If we assume that there won’t be any changes in the new tariffs, then there will be a lot less logs coming out of Russia. Small hardwood logs are exempt from the higher tariffs, but large Birch logs mainly going for plywood in Finland and all softwood logs will stay in Russia after January 2009.

Countries that are currently importing these logs (mainly Finland, China and Japan), have to look elsewhere for softwood logs if they want to continue to supply their industry. Indirectly this may increase competition for logs coming from other parts of the world. This will lead to higher log costs in some markets. Some businesses and even countries will have to evaluate whether or not they want to scale back production or keep current levels in place.

The Russian situation will lead to increased opportunities for raw logs coming from the United States and Canada. This trend has already started as more Hemlock on the West Coast is being sent to Korea. I believe that some companies are not waiting until January to start looking for alternative sources of material. Companies in Finland are looking at Sweden and the Baltic states for additional logs. The global flow of logs has already started to change, and we will see more of that in the near future. In the long term, we may see more countries decide to import more finished products and process fewer logs.

TimberLine: Newspapers are filled with reports about illegal logging taking place around the globe. Will efforts to encourage certification and cut down on illegal logging really make much of a difference?

Ekstrom: If we talk about Russia, which is the country that exports the most illegal logs, obviously the export tax won’t have an impact since those logs are illegal. A lot of those volumes are going to China for material that doesn’t have to be certified anyway. It will take a long time before certification will have a big impact on illegal logs from Russia.

The impact of certification on tropical wood will move a little bit faster. Most of that material or finished goods are going to Europe, and they are starting to be tougher on making sure that wood is not illegally cut and has some kind of certification stamp on it. If you are talking about tropical wood going into Japan or China, they care less about certification. Those cutting forests in Brazil or Africa may just decide to ship the material to Asia instead of Europe if they are concerned about certification. As long as you have a market for those products, it will be hard to eliminate much of the illegal logging taking place in some countries.

Then there are some countries like Malaysia that stand out as a producer of certified tropical wood. They are major exporters of tropical wood products. And they are really trying to do a good job and develop an image that they only export products that come from legal sources and have certification stamps.

TimberLine: American hardwoods have a strong reputation around the world. How will U.S. producers fare in the future? What will be the key drivers that will enable or limit success?

Ekstrom: Smaller hardwood logs in the southern U.S. are going primarily into the pulp market. That industry is pretty competitive. If you look at the cost of the raw material going into pulp mills in the South compared to the rest of the world, it looks pretty good. I believe the pulp industry in the South will remain fairly competitive, which should fuel strong demand for small hardwood logs.

Larger hardwood logs and the demand for American hardwood products will do fairly well in the future for a couple of reasons. The raw material is fairly steady. You have a good market working with lots of buyers and sellers. Right now and probably over the next 3-5 years, maybe longer, the weak U.S. dollar makes it easier for exports to compete. Over time demand for tropical wood products will decline as consumers begin to look for a stamp that indicates the wood came from a legal source and was managed in a sustainable way. Certification is something that U.S. companies can deliver on in the future.

The key thing is that the industry needs to invest and be more efficient. Companies should not try to cut back even if times are hard but rather increase investments in scanners, optimizers and other equipment to be competitive now and in the future.

TimberLine: What are major competitors around the globe to the U.S. hardwood industry when it comes to log and lumber exports? How do you think this will change in the future?

Ekstrom: On the tropical side, major competitors are Latin America, Asia and Africa. But we will assume that the supply coming from regions will decline. When you talk about temperate hardwoods, there are not that many places out there – primarily Germany and France. If you look at Russia, it has Birch, Oak and Ash that could be competitive in the future. They are not competitive now because they don’t have a working industry.

More Eucalyptus will come on the market as more sawmills figure out how to use it to produce lumber, furniture and components. Eucalyptus is fast growing and cheap. You are starting to see Eucalyptus for cabinet doors and flooring. You can stain it to make the material look like Cherry or other hardwoods. There will definitely be applications for Eucalyptus. IKEA, the furniture company, is looking into using more Eucalyptus in the future.

TimberLine: What do you see taking place right now in the low grade markets in this country? What impact will these trends have on prices?

Ekstrom: It all depends if you are a buyer or a seller. It looks pretty good if you are in the South and are a buyer of logs and lumber. Competition is not as strong for material as it was a couple of years ago. If you go back two years, you may have had competition for the same log from a sawmill, an OSB plant and pulp mill. Right now, it is mostly the pulp mills competing for the low grade material because the OSB plants and sawmills have curved production. It is always difficult to generalize for the Southern U.S. because it is such a big market. There are some places where landowners are less eager to harvest timber because they are starting to use more land for recreation and other purposes. Generally, in the South you see less pressure on the resource in 2008. Therefore, prices for logs have started to come down. However, this downward trend will change when lumber markets improve in 2009 or 2010.

On the West Coast, the market is shifting a little bit the other way. There is more pressure on the round wood resources. Sawmills have been cutting back production so there are fewer residual wood chips. Pulp mills are forced to go out and look for round wood instead of chips, which results in more competition and higher costs. This is a good thing if you are a landowner, but a bad thing if you are buying logs for pallets or other uses.

Looking ahead as long as the housing starts stay where they are and lumber production is down, I don’t see any major changes that will impact prices of logs in the U.S. market.

TimberLine: Asia is a huge consumer of the world’s wood supply. Do you believe there will be huge opportunities for American exports to continue to grow in this region?

Ekstrom: Japan is the big consumer of lumber. They are the big importers of softwood logs. There are opportunities for the U.S. to export more logs to Japan and long term to China as well. It’s just that in China they don’t build houses the same way that the Japanese do. They don’t need as much lumber. They are two very different markets.

When it comes to hardwood, there will be import opportunities of both logs and lumber because domestic consumption is rising and the manufacturing of wood products for export continues to go up because it is cheaper to do a lot of things in China than North America or Europe. Neither China nor Japan have large forest reserves so much of their raw material has to be shipped in from other parts of the world.

TimberLine: How is the rise in energy costs impacting finished good producers in Asia that have to buy raw material from other countries? Could high fuel prices cause some of those jobs to come back to North America?

Ekstrom: Even though energy costs have gone up significantly, it is still a fairly small share of the total cost of producing items, such as furniture. Their labor costs are so much lower than our costs. Higher energy costs are affecting their margins. But it will not have any major impact on the trade of logs or lumber.

A little more logs are shifting into Vietnam than China just because it is slightly cheaper to produce in Vietnam than China. But you won’t see a shift back to the U.S. again. We have to accept that Asian countries will continue to do the more labor intensive things while American companies will have to do more sophisticated things requiring automation.

TimberLine: Timber production from Latin America has boomed over the past decade. Do you believe this trend will continue? Why?

Ekstrom: Yes, they will continue to expand plantations in Brazil. They will continue to grow more on every acre five years from now than they do today. You see the same in Uruguay. This could also happen in Venezuela, Colombia, or Nicaragua. It all depends on what happens with the politics in those countries. As a continent, Latin America can certainly boost its production capacity. Trees grow faster down there than in more temperate climates, and they have a lot of land that is not used for anything.

When it comes to plantations and developing the right tree clones, Latin America countries are probably ahead of the rest of the world. If we want to learn something about fast growing Eucalyptus, we have to go down to Brazil.

Brazil has become a large producer of hardwood pulp to the world. Brazil and Uruguay have invested the most money in this technology over the past five years and have the most modern pulp mills in the world.

TimberLine: Is Latin America a major competitor for U.S. raw wood exports? Please explain the competitive tension between these two regions.

Ekstrom: No, the U.S. doesn’t really export lots of logs outside of North America. Its exports are limited to Canada, Japan, Korea and China. And in terms of lumber, a lot of that material is unique species, Doug Fir, Cedar, Oak, Beach, Red Alder, and you don’t have those species down in Brazil. What they produce down there on plantations is fast growing pine. Some markets that the South sells into with SYP may experience competition from Brazil. That is probably the only area where Brazil would compete in an export market against the U.S. sawmills.

Russia, not Latin America, is the largest exporter of raw logs around the globe.

TimberLine: Since Russia is such a big player in the export market, won’t its recent tariff decisions increase opportunities for U.S. exports?

Ekstrom: It is definitely going to change how things are done in some areas, especially Japan and China. There are not a lot of places they can go for softwood material. They can source from New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the U.S. They have to decide if they want to buy logs or lumber.

Some exporters in North America are looking into the prospects of putting lumber, logs and even wood chips into cargo containers for return trips back to Asian countries.

With favorable exchange rates, there could definitely be good opportunities for U.S. companies to export both logs and lumber to Asia. The U.S. has the resources and now a pretty competitive cost structure. Asia is where the demand is increasing for all different kind of forest products. The next step is to see if American companies can find the right distribution channels and understand the markets in Asia.

Source-timberlinemag.com

Enporion Named Among Top Innovators by Supply & Demand Chain Executive 100

Enporion, a leading provider of supply chain solutions and professional services, has been named to Supply & Demand Chain Executive magazine's Top 100 companies for the third consecutive year. This achievement recognizes Enporion's continuing commitment to its customers and to delivering best-of-class supply chain solutions.

"Our readers turn to Supply & Demand Chain Executive to learn about new solutions and best practices for enabling the supply chain, to understand trends in supply chain technology, and to benchmark their own companies' enablement initiatives with those of other enterprises across industry verticals," explained Andrew K. Reese, editor of Supply & Demand Chain Executive. "Enporion was chosen for the Supply & Demand Chain Executive 100 this year because of its ability to leverage established supplier networks as a 'single point of contact' with suppliers from order issuance through e-invoice settlement. The company has truly shown itself as an innovator in end-to-end e-procurement."

"Enporion has always strived to provide innovative solutions to its customers and we are thrilled to be recognized for our innovation in end-to-end e-procurement as it truly represents the full suite of what we offer customers -- a complete source-to-settle solution," said George Gordon, Chairman and CEO of Enporion. "In addition, we are continuing to introduce significant innovation as we enable the integration of physical and financial supply chains, also acknowledged in the magazine."

This year the magazine focused the criteria for its "100" feature on supply chain innovation. Supply & Demand Chain Executive has identified leading providers of supply chain services and technologies who are at the forefront of innovation. Based on submissions to the "100" from end users and solution providers, the judging committee for the "100," including the editorial staff of the magazine, in conjunction with the editorial advisory board, has compiled a list of leading supply and demand chain innovators.

About Enporion

Enporion is a supply chain management solutions and services company, providing strategic sourcing and e-procurement applications, and related professional services. Enporion is delivering results for customers in the gas and electric utilities, manufacturing and distribution industries.

Enporion's Supply Chain Manager(R), an integrated suite of e-commerce tools, delivers cost reduction through price and process savings, and includes capabilities in catalog management, supplier enablement and connection, spend reporting, e-sourcing including auctions and electronic RFx's, and contract management. These applications are delivered in a Software-as-a-Service environment, resulting in quick implementation and early realization of benefits. Visit Enporion online at www.enporion.com.
Source-marketwatch.com

Wordingham Technologies Adds Online Support for Supply Chain Management

Wordingham Technologies, specialists in custom machined parts for optics, photonics and precision instrumentation, announces online customer access for tracking orders and managing releases, 24/7. The Wordingham Quality (WQ) Portal, the first of its kind in this industry, demonstrates Wordingham's commitment to "quality delivered."

"Quality isn't just delivering tight tolerances and great aesthetics, important as those are," says David Trombley, Wordingham General Manager, "it's helping our customers get their parts when they need them, even when their plans change."

The WQ Portal allows customers to log on to a secure site, accessible from http://www.wordingham.com, and view critical planning information. This information includes:

    -- Inventories of all their custom parts
   -- Orders in process
   -- Planned releases
   -- Recent releases
   -- In-process delivery tracking information
   -- Pending quotes
   -- Immediate request for in-person help if desired

Trombley continues, "We want to do all we can to help our customers manage their supply chains better. In today's global markets, victory goes to the agile. That's why we invested in the WQ Portal and made it as easy to use as we could. While we will always give fast in-person response to questions, self-service access is a big plus, particularly to our international customers."

Mike Jackson, Inside Sales Representative and developer of the WQ Portal, notes, "Early feedback has been fantastic. The WQ Portal is letting our customers monitor plans for their own customer deliveries in a new way. But that's not all. The WQ Portal is also helping them construct winning bids for new business, faster and easier, by providing real-time data 24/7."

About Wordingham Technologies

Wordingham Technologies provides full-service, dock-to-stock metal machining, including: multi-axis milling, multi-axis turning, honing, advanced metrology, finishing and mechanical sub-assembly. Though ultimately serving many markets, Wordingham focuses on custom parts for Optics and Photonics, including illumination, medical/biometric, and defense and security; and for Precision Instrumentation, including measurement, data collection/transfer and nano-positioning.

Wordingham Technologies' competitive edge is people: their deep commitment and strong optics roots. From its start as an outgrowth of Burleigh Instruments, an early market leader in life science optics and nano-positioning systems, the company has grown to a team of over 50 with a proven track record for producing high quality precision optics interfaces. Visit http://www.wordingham.com to learn more.
Source-marketwatch.com

New BSR Report Outlines Lessons on Building Supply Chain Capacity for CSR

While many companies concerned about corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues in their supply chain tend to focus on monitoring factory conditions, a new report by Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) reveals that companies working directly with factory managers to equip suppliers with skills, knowledge and systems to take ownership of CSR issues are more effective in addressing persistent issues such as labor standards violations, environmental degradation, and poor health and safety protections.

BSR's "Pilot Summary Report: Building Capabilities to Implement CSR Management Systems at ICT Suppliers in China" is based on a series of recently completed pilot projects aimed at breaking through common barriers to improving factory conditions. Organizations in this collaborative project include BSR, the World Bank Group’s investment climate advisory service, the Foreign Investment Advisory Service (FIAS), the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC), the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) and the Shenzhen Electronics Industry Association (SEIA). In 2007, the collaboration published a report identifying the root causes of poor factory conditions, and providing recommendations for how customers, suppliers, government and civil society can all contribute to improved capacity among factories in China.

Based on findings from these reports and the recent pilot projects, there are several steps companies can take to build capacity in their supply chains:

• Support multiple capacity-building strategies. Approaches can include providing generic tools (such as a factory committee or worker hotline to address concerns), conducting trainings, creating supplier-support networks and implementing factory-specific projects.
  
  
• Focus on the business case. To achieve buy-in from suppliers, identify real incentives and allow supplies to shape their own approach to CSR improvements within the factory.
  
  
• Integrate a mentoring system into the monitoring process. Work with the supplier to identify root causes of compliance issues. This strengthens the relationship between the company and the supplier, shifting focus from immediate compliance to continuous improvement.
  
  
• Foster ongoing dialogue among stakeholders. These include customers, suppliers, NGOs, local government and industry associations. This reinforces each group’s efforts, creating the potential for a much bigger impact on everyone’s CSR efforts.

Moving forward, BSR will apply these lessons to other industries and countries. "The challenges with capability building identified in these reports are not unique to the ICT sector or to China, and many of the recommendations can be applied to a wide variety of sectors and geographies," said Laura Commike Gitman, BSR Director, Advisory Services. "The project partners look forward to building on these lessons to help focus future capability-building efforts."

For more information about BSR's work in this partnership, please contact Laura Commike Gitman at lgitman@bsr.org.



About BSR
Since 1992, Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) has been providing socially responsible business solutions to many of the world’s leading corporations. Headquartered in San Francisco and with offices in Beijing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, New York and Paris, BSR is a nonprofit business association that serves its 250 member companies and other Global 1000 enterprises. Through advisory services, convenings and research, BSR works with corporations and concerned stakeholders of all types to create a more just and sustainable global economy. For more information, visit www.bsr.org.

About the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition
The EICC consists of 30 companies that have come together in their common interest to improve working conditions and environmental stewardship throughout the electronics supply chain. This group supports a common code of conduct for electronics companies, the Electronic Industry Code of Conduct. The code covers expectations for performance across a range of issues, including labor, health and safety, environmental practices, ethics and management systems. Through its board, steering committee and working groups, the group is working to implement the code of conduct, engaging with stakeholders and keeping the code up to date. For more information, visit www.eicc.info.

About the Global e-Sustainability Initiative
GeSI is a joint initiative of an international group of ICT service providers and suppliers, industry associations, the Carbon Disclosure Project and WWF, with the support of the United Nations Environment Programme and International Telecommunication Union. GeSI seeks to contribute to sustainable development in the ICT industry by taking a leadership role in collaborative exploration and responsible management of the evolving interfaces among industrial, ecological and social systems. The EICC and GeSI are working together on development and deployment of a consistent set of tools and processes to measure, monitor and improve supply chain corporate responsibility performance across the ICT sector. Information about GeSI members and ongoing activities can be found at www.gesi.org.
Source-csrwire.com

Supply Chain:Warehouse Management System (WMS)

SUCCEEDING IN today’s competitive environment requires warehouses to guarantee customer and supplier satisfaction by providing accurate and profitable warehouse processes associated with productivity. Outdated software applications, poor system integration, and bad accounting inventory tracking solutions can result in a lack of inventory visibility and control. These challenges can prevent warehouse operators from increasing their profitability within and beyond the four walls of a location or multiple warehouses.

WMS BENEFITS:

Increase customer satisfaction, improve employee productivity, eliminate paperwork, data entry, remove IT headache, eliminate maintenance and upgrade costs, reduce inventory costs, automate warehouse operations, avoid stock-outs centralise visibility, compatible with wireless technology, gain immediate ReturnOnInvestment (ROI), complete back-office integration.

Warehouse Management System (WMS) helps warehouses consolidate and manage all inbound purchase orders across departments through one centralised system to streamline the “procure-to-pay” or “procure to receipt” purchase process. By centrally managing these purchasing processes, warehouse accounting can improve productivity and eliminate duplicate data-entry.

Integrating business processes from the back office to the warehouse floor helps streamline the receiving and put-away process by tying receipts to inbound orders. Within the inbound order process, the WMS solution also sources available suppliers from historical perform and based rating system generates customised purchasing and supplier reports automates receiving against inbound orders eliminates paper-based purchasing to lower costs reconciles orders against errors or short shipments.

Keep customer commitments with error-free order fulfillment WMS offers the ability to maximise the productivity of a company’s sales and warehouse staff by providing a centralised system to manage the flow of inventory from sales order, to pick, to ship, to invoice.

With WMS, both sales and warehouse operators effectively manage and access the same accurate customer data to fulfill orders quickly and accurately while shortening lead times. WMS also allows sales and warehouse operators to check real-time, accurate product availability during order fulfillment through integrated inventory control generate pick tickets and shipping documents directly from the sales order gain process efficiency with picking rules view sales order and shipment status from a central view.

Inherent value in on-demand software on-demand architecture enables warehouses to quickly deploy and integrate with front-office an back-office operations. As a managed service, there is no hardware to buy, no software to install, no network to set-up and no technical staff to maintain. As a result, warehouse operators don’t have to worry about system deployments, performance, reliability or upgrades It’s WMS worry not yours.

WMS is an affordable solution that grows with you. Warehouses can easily add users, additional warehouses or SKUs with simple and easy-to-use configuration settings. Delivered over the Internet, WMS is more cost-effective then traditional software solutions and provides users with an intuitive interface to help increase employee adoption.

WMS solution:
Eliminates IT headaches, improves reliability and scalability provides real-time information and integrates easily with computer hardware.

Source-merinews.com

Elders increases commitment to livestock supply chain

Elders Rural Services managing director Mike Guerin says Elders will create a Customer Solutions Management unit solely focused on meeting customer demand for Australian meat and livestock.

“As well as servicing Australian agricultural producers, one of the most important core functions performed by Elders Rural Services is the supply of livestock to our processor, feedlot, live export and retail purchasing customers from our producer client base,” Mr Guerin said.

The new Customer Solutions Management unit will be led by Elders’ National Marketing Manager for Meat & Livestock, Hamish Browning, reporting to Elders’ General Manager Meat & Livestock, Jack Gleeson.

Mr Gleeson says the core functions of this Customer Solutions Management business unit are to:

• Develop and deliver improved and targeted service to key livestock purchasing customers.

• Facilitate the introduction of strategic innovations that drive value creation for key purchasing customer businesses.

• Mobilise, influence, and coordinate network supply chain capabilities to meet identified purchasing customer demand requirements.

Source : sl.farmonline.com.au

NHS Supply Chain extends iSOFT contract

NHS Supply Chain has extended iSOFT's contract to host its e-commerce and logistics applications until 2010, the IT provider has announced.

The contract is an extension of a ten-year partnership that began with NHS Supply Chain’s predecessor NHS Logistics.

The solution provided by iSOFT, which is part of the IBA Health Group, includes a fully hosted management service and a dual data centre operation. Applications are run in tandem at two separate data centres to safeguard against potential disasters.

Warehouse and management distributions applications are developed and supported by IBA subsidiary iB solutions under a separate contract.

Paul Richards, managing director of iSOFT UK and Ireland, said: “The long-standing relationship with NHS Supply Chain is built on a true partnership in which we constantly review and develop our service model with the customer to ensure we continually meet its evolving business requirements.”

NHS Supply Chain delivers equipment and supplies to 600 NHS hospitals, GP surgeries and other healthcare organisations from six regional distribution centres, as well as providing an online ordering facility and other e-commerce services.

Source: hesmagazine.com

RedPrairie Improves Flow of Goods from Manufacturing to Store Shelf with latest E2e(TM) Supply Chain Execution Suite Release

New release provides synchronized flow of goods, tighter integration between WMS and TMS, advanced recall capabilities and embedded parcel manifesting functionality

MILWAUKEE — RedPrairie Corporation, a world leading consumer driven optimization company, is introducing a new release of its E2e(TM) supply chain execution solution suite. The enhanced solution provides new and upgraded capabilities for better flow of goods, tighter integration between warehouse and transportation management solutions, advanced recall and quality assurance capabilities and new parcel manifesting functionality.

Better facilitation for the flow of goods - The new release offers enhanced functionality to manage diverse distribution environments. Comments Tom Kozenski, RedPrairie(R) Vice President Product Strategy, "Supply chain operations have undergone tremendous changes in today's consumer driven marketplace. Storage warehouses are being retooled as flow-through processing centers where inbound and outbound shipments are synchronized to optimize the inventory flow in a multi-channel order fulfillment operation. This agile movement of goods must be visible and efficient."

Tighter integration between WMS and TMS - Planning and synchronization of the movement of goods is shared between RedPrairie Warehouse Management (WMS) and Transportation Management (TMS) applications. The TMS can plan the sequence in which distribution orders are fulfilled by the WMS based on the most economical shipment plan meeting customer service requirements. The store shipment schedule is used by TMS to optimize routes and ensure that customer delivery agreements are met. The RedPrairie Collaboration Portal(TM) is used by carriers and suppliers to coordinate appointment scheduling within the WMS and TMS.

For inbound processing, the system offers flexible assignment and movement of received inventory for pre-allocated distribution. Tony Brown, SVP Global Supply Chain for J.Crew, says, "Expediting the movement of goods from receiving to outbound shipments is crucial to keeping shelves stocked while reducing handling costs. It's an important part of our distribution strategy at J.Crew."

Improved recall and quality assurance capabilities - With all of the recent publicity on major recalls of everything from children's toys to meats, quality assurance is a critical inbound activity. The RedPrairie release offers enhanced web-based QA / Recall capabilities to enable track-and-trace from the point of origin to the ultimate destination. Paired with RedPrairie's new E2e(TM) Business Process Platform, these capabilities make one-button recalls a reality.

Integrated parcel manifesting - With the new release, RedPrairie has embedded its parcel manifesting system within WMS and TMS to provide certified least-cost shipping by all the major parcel carriers. It handles domestic and international shipments and provides shipment visibility to the customer's door.

"With parcel shipments becoming a larger percentage of transportation spend, it has increased the importance of parcel manifesting applications," says Adrian Gonzalez, Director Logistics Executive Council for ARC Advisory Group. "It is an especially critical factor for sectors such as retail, service parts and direct to consumer."

"This new solution further enables synchronization of the flow of goods and information from manufacturing to the store shelf. The seamless flow is critical in the transformation to demand-driven business operations where real-time collaboration between suppliers, distributors, third party logistics providers and retailers is the foundation for agile supply chain and replenishment processes," says Mike Mayoras, CEO for RedPrairie.

RedPrairie's new version of the supply chain suite is now available in general release and is being implemented at many new client sites. The solution is being demonstrated for attendees of its 11th Annual User Conference, RedShift, held at the Doral Golf Resort & Spa in Miami, Florida.

About RedPrairie Corporation

RedPrairie is a world leading consumer driven optimization company. Built on an advanced Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) developed over the past 15 years, the RedPrairie integrated suite of solutions offers on-demand capabilities to over 32,000 sites worldwide for many of the world's largest companies.

RedPrairie's E2e(TM) solutions synchronize people and products throughout the customer buying cycle to ensure goods reach the right place at the right time. At the point of sale, this means consumers have access to desired products and that the store is staffed with the right people to help them make their purchases. In the production cycle, it means suppliers and manufacturers time and synchronize shipments and production based on demand signals from the retailer. And in the back room of the store, it means having the least amount of inventory, solving the "last yard" problem of the retail supply chain.

With 20 global service sites and standard service methods that have been validated over the last 30 years, RedPrairie provides unparalleled service and support. For additional information, call 1.877.733.7724, or access www.RedPrairie.com.

RedPrairie is a registered trademark of RedPrairie Corporation.

E2e is a trademark of RedPrairie Corporation.

Other product and service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respective owners .

Source: centredaily.com/business

Supply-Chain Fraud Risks Primary Concern for Companies

Vulnerability to supply-chain fraud risks are on the rise as supply lines of South Korean companies become more extended and complex.

As a result, experts say, companies have become the target of an array of frauds ranging from simple theft, misrepresentation of inventory, gray market diversion, counterfeiting and even piracy.

Fraud thrives on complexity and companies are faced with fraud from the very beginning because of global growth and increased outsourcing, according to a recent Global Fraud Report released by Kroll, the New York-based risk consulting firm.

South Korean IT giants, which have already acknowledged the significance of such issues in managing their businesses on overseas markets, are planning to inject fresh capital to strengthen their supply-chain management systems.

With hefty investment, LG Electronics has recently finished the completion of its ``Global Supply-Chain Management System.’’

``The system is intended to face off increasing financial damages triggered by poor supply-chain management on overseas markets,’’ an LG official said Monday. LG, the world’s No. 3 flat-screen TV and No. 4 handset maker, reaps some 70 percent of its sales overseas.

``We could increase productivity by 10 percent as the system makes it possible to cut inventory levels and lead times, and to check the current status of product shipments in real-time,’’ the official said.

Samsung Electronics doesn’t have immediate plans to invest more in supply-chain management. However, the company is tightening it to cut costs.

``We are in an expansionary track in some emerging markets, meaning we don’t have a set cutoff in terms of pricing’’ a Samsung Electronics official said. In a first-quarter earnings briefing, the company’s Vice President Chu Woo-sik reported an impressive performance due to its advantage in supply-chain management.

Over 90 percent of Samsung Electronics’ sales are overseas.

Hynix Semiconductor, which has been accelerating efforts to expand the foundry (contract) business with Taiwan-based strategic partners to cut costs amid the bearish global chip market, also plans to complete its global supply system, embracing clients by early 2009.

Unlike the information technology sector, the pharmaceutical industry has struggled to tackle increasing supply-chain problems because of the sector’s ``increasingly complex patterns of production, distribution and sales.’’

Citing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Kroll said the volume of counterfeit drugs in the supply chain increased fivefold between 2001 and 2007, with fraudulent e-pharmacies raking in up to $6 billion per year..

``It is really difficult to have a strong supply-chain management system because drugs are easy to copy,’’ an official from Pfizer said, adding internal theft throughout the supply chain is a major risk as well.

Source: koreatimes.co.kr

Integration Point Expands Presence in Asia

Global Trade Management Software Provider Continues Successful Growth

Integration Point, a provider of real time global trade management solutions, announced its expanded Asian presence with the opening of a new office in Gujarat, India. Integration Point is conducting this expansion in response to the continued market growth in the Asia region.

Integration Point provides a web-based Global Trade Management (GTM) system which allows users to securely access up-to-date global trade content, compliance and connectivity at each point of the supply chain transaction. By integrating critical information from otherwise separate systems such as logistics, ERP, warehouse management and local country databases, Integration Point creates a global trade network connecting multiple members of the trade community electronically to regulatory agencies around the world.

“Web-based Global Trade Management technologies provide a lot of potential to help companies improve efficiency and reduce costs in the global supply chain,” noted Integration Point’s Senior VP of Global Markets, Clay Perry. “There is a clear increase in the demand for our products in Asia, and we are responding to that demand with an increased local presence.”

About Integration Point, Inc.

Integration Point®, Inc.’s Real Time Global Trade Management helps many of the best known companies import and export goods more effectively by providing up-to-date international trade compliance. Integration Point’s solution is a comprehensive suite of fully integrated, web-based software products that provide consistent and secure access to information around the clock including: Import/Export Management, Global Classification, C-TPAT, AEO, Denied Party Screening, Free Trade Agreement qualification and Duty Deferral Program participation. Companies dependent on efficient import/export of goods rely on Integration Point to help them quickly and accurately navigate through the often complex and dynamic requirements of global trade. Contact Integration Point at www.IntegrationPoint.net or 704-576-3678.