Business Case: Embracing Supply Chain automation for improved efficiency and cost-reduction

Insight:

The role of AI in streamlining Supply Chain & Logistics

Insight:

Retail store of the future

Context

This business case concerns the supply chain’s operations of a leading Middle Eastern organisation. This scenario highlights the importance of streamlining and automating supply chain processes for both air and sea freight to leverage the collective buying power, optimize efficiency, and reduce operational costs.

Challenges and opportunities

The organization's supply chain operations was suffering from disparate processes across countries and within different departments, making it challenging to establish a consistent, efficient, and cost-effective workflow. In addition, the lack of process implementation has resulted in an excessive number of manual processes that are not only time-consuming but also costly and prone to error.

Transformation Strategy

The key focus was to streamline and automate the supply chain processes of the organization in phased steps. We have first conducted a thorough audit of its current end to end supply chain processes to identify areas of inefficiency and potential for automation. We have then adopted a reverse engineering approach, starting from the final product price and tracing back to the manufacturer. This involved a detailed analysis of all associated costs in order to pinpoint critical areas for process optimization and cost reduction. Finally, we have aligned with the management a roadmap highlighting critical steps in the path of optimizing the end to end supply chain operations.

Results

The successful implementation of these initiatives have demonstrated the effectiveness of a strategic approach to supply chain operations and the significant impact it can have on commercial growth:

  • The automation significantly enhanced the efficiency of supply chain operations.

  • By improving accuracy of the granular data, the organization has witnessed considerable cost savings. By providing real-time data and analytics, the automation has offered enhanced visibility of the entire supply chain. This improved control allowed the organization to make proactive decisions, mitigating risks and optimizing operations.

  • The automation system was designed to scale, allowing the organization to easily expand its operations without a proportional increase in overheads. This scalability will be a significant advantage as the organization continues to grow.

Conclusion

Adopting supply chain automation was a critical step forward for this leading Middle Eastern organization. By automating its supply chain processes, the organization has eliminated process disparity, increased productivity, and saved time and costs, thereby strengthening its position in the market.

“Change before you have to”

— Jack Welch, CEO of General Electric