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Microsoft announces the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform, a new design approach for supply chain agility, automation and sustainability

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Microsoft announces the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform, a new design approach for supply chain agility, automation and sustainability

Microsoft announces the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform, a new design approach for supply chain agility, automation and sustainability

Microsoft Corp. announced the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform, which helps organizations maximize their supply chain data estate investment with an open approach, bringing the best of Microsoft AI, collaboration, low-code, security and SaaS applications in a composable platform.

The company also announced the preview of Microsoft Supply Chain Center, a ready-made command center for supply chain visibility and transformation and part of the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform. Supply Chain Center is designed to work natively with an organization’s supply chain data and applications, with built-in collaboration, supply and demand insights, and order management.

“Businesses are dealing with petabytes of data spread across legacy systems, ERP, supply chain management and point solutions, resulting in a fragmented view of the supply chain,” said Charles Lamanna, corporate vice president, Microsoft Business Applications and Platform. “Supply chain agility and resilience are directly tied to how well organizations connect and orchestrate their data across all relevant systems. The Microsoft Supply Chain Platform and Supply Chain Center enable organizations to make the most of their existing investments to gain insights and act quickly.”

“Supply chain solutions are more critical than ever. Our early assessment of the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform and Supply Chain Center is that the company has put its technology, applications and resources together in a way that will serve its customer base well in a wide swath of IT and operations environments, offering flexibility for diverse IT environments and continuous agility for transformation into the future,” said Daniel Newman, founding partner and principal analyst of Futurum Research.

The Microsoft Supply Chain Platform: An open, collaborative and composable foundation for data and supply chain orchestration

With today’s announcement, we are making it easier for customers to realize the value of the Microsoft Cloud for their supply chain. The Microsoft Supply Chain Platform provides the building blocks across Azure, Dynamics 365, Microsoft Teams and Power Platform for customers to develop or independently adopt capabilities for their supply chain needs. With Dataverse, customers can create thousands of connectors to gain visibility across supply chain, develop custom workflows with low-code solutions in Power Platform, and securely collaborate internally and externally through the power of Teams. With tools and processes that drive positive impact, the platform can enable organizations to gain deeper insights and minimize the carbon impact of their organization and supply chain.

Read more at Microsoft announces the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform, a new design approach for supply chain agility, automation and sustainability

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Photo by Turag Photography on Unsplash

The Impact of Hurricanes on Transportation and How to Build a Storm Resilient Supply Chain

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This report looks at data before and after Hurricane Harvey in August 2017 and dives into the true cost and volume impacts experienced by logistics customers; it also shares advice on how shippers can prepare for another 2018 challenging storm season.

2017 Tropical Storm Harvey

Hurricanes have massive impacts on transportation capacity and spend.

To better understand true cost and volume impacts, Zipline Logistics evaluated a sample of 33,000 shipments, comparing data prior to the 2017 Tropical Storm Harvey with data after the event.

Access the full report and keep reading this post for the advice you can use to prepare your supply chain for the next tumultuous storm season (Note: the Atlantic Hurricane season runs from June 1 through the end of November.)

Hurricane Impacts on Transportation

We leveraged our KanoPI shipper intelligence platform to dig deep into hurricane impacts. Here’s what we found;

Market surcharges due to hurricane activity were the costliest of added fees in 2017 with a total cost of $673,000.91.

Data shows that the Average Cost Per Load after the 8/26 hurricane went up by $159.58, or 11% and that the Average Cost Per Mile increased by 15%.

915 fewer loads moved after the hurricane (date of 8/26/2017) when compared to previous four-month period. This tells us that people were holding on to shipments that would typically have moved into key areas like Florida, Texas, and surrounding states.

Looking specifically at Florida, there was an 8% drop in volume and 3.4% drop in spending. This shows that for shipments still moved, rates were higher.

Read more at The Impact of Hurricanes on Transportation and How to Build a Storm Resilient Supply Chain

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Walmart Canada partners with FourKites for supply chain analytics

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The Canadian branch of Walmart has agreed a new partnership with FourKites for the development and furthering of the company’s supply chain visibility and predictive analytics capabilities.

Walmart Canada will use FourKites supply chain platform to track the real time location and predictive shipment times across its Canadian operations that span over 400 stores a number of distributions centers within the region.

Walmart staff will be able to use FourKites’ mobile app to track these, leveraging the company’s GPS-connected assets.

“Walmart Canada’s partnership with FourKites reflects our deep commitment to delivering an outstanding customer experience,” said John Bayliss, senior vice president, logistics & supply chain.

“We will use FourKites’ predictive tracking technology to know precisely when shipments will arrive at our distribution centers and at our stores, so we can ensure that customers find the products they’re looking for so they can save money and live better.”

The implementation of this technology will allow Walmart Canada to better optimize its operations, including staffing levels, assignments and minimizing truck waiting times.

Read more at Walmart Canada partners with FourKites for supply chain analytics

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Samsung eyes blockchain technology to cut supply chain costs by 20%

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Samsung is targeting the introduction of blockchain technology that could reduce its global shipping costs by up to 20%.

Song Kwang-woo, vice president of Samsung SDS, the Korean multinational’s specialist technology arm, has revealed the company is investigating the possibility of using a blockchain ledger system to ‘fuel its digital transformation’.

By automating channels of communication both internally and with port authorities, it predicts that it will be able to improve efficiency by up to a fifth – potentially saving billions of dollars every year.

“It (blockchain) will have an enormous impact on the supply chains of manufacturing industries,” said Song, speaking to Bloomberg. “Blockchain is a core platform to fuel our digital transformation.”

Samsung works with approximately 2500 suppliers around the world, building relationships around five key criteria: cost competitiveness, human resources capacity, on-time delivery, response to risk and supplier competitiveness. SDS says it will handle around 488,000 tonnes of air cargo and 1mn TEUs in 2018 alone.

Last May, SDS launched a blockchain pilot to track imports and exports of shipments in Korea’s shipping sector, a trial that concluded at the end of the year.

Read more Samsung eyes blockchain technology to cut supply chain costs by 20%

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Four Steps to Building a Global Chain Risk Management Platform

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Be proactive – and significantly reduce global supply chain risks, discover the 4 steps to building a global supply chain risk management platform in a white paper from Avetta.

A global marketplace presents a complex set of challenges, especially when attempting to maintain a safe and sustainable working environment for your employees, contractors, and suppliers.

A minor detail, if left unresolved on the front end, can explode into a financial or operational disaster.

But the implementation of a world-class risk mitigation solution can save time, money, and even lives.

It’s critical to have the plans, resources, and technology in place that verify credentials, measure financial stability, and encourage sustainable business practices.

A proven supply chain risk management partner can ensure that your program is configured efficiently, intuitively, and effectively.

Save your business from negative impacts to its revenue and reputation by taking the right steps to minimize global supply chain risks.

In this white paper from Avetta, you’ll learn the keys to successfully managing your supply chain, protecting it against avoidable situations, and recovering from unforeseen disasters.

Find out how to better equip your business to prevent:

  1. Incidents caused by under-qualified or untrustworthy contractors or suppliers
  2. Injury to employees, contractors, suppliers – and the obligation of medical expenses associated with them
  3. Direct costs such as damaged goods and materials, machinery repair, and insurance deductibles
  4. Indirect costs including revenue loss from brand damage, employee and supplier down time, production delays, and fines

Read more at Four Steps to Building a Global Chain Risk Management Platform

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How a pharmaceutical supply chain company is taking advantage of the Internet of Things

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In 2014, during a routine check from the Ministry of Health in the U.S., it was found that only 55 percent of vaccines were stored and transported in the temperature conditions that ensured the medication maintained its quality. To put that into perspective, every baby born receives vaccines to prevent diseases such as small pox and measles. If only 55 percent of those vaccinations maintain safety requirements, that creates a situation where a majority of babies don’t get the quality dosage and medication they need to protect them from diseases.

To overcome this challenge, organizations are turning to technology. More specifically, the Internet of Things (IoT) is making it possible to ensure the safer transportation and delivery of medications. Dutch pharmaceutical services company, AntTail, is paving the way for building innovative IoT applications that more effectively track the conditions of medications while in transit.

The team at AntTail built an IoT application using the Mendix low-code application development platform. The application collects sensor data from medication shipments to provide information on temperature, as well as send push notifications to patients with reminders on when to take the medication.

One of the barriers for creating IoT apps is the requirement of many disparate technologies. AntTail uses a central router as a hub for all of the sensors, collecting the data when there is a connection and storing the data when there is no connection to ensure that no data is lost. The Router uses Vodafone’s Managed IoT Connectivity Platform as a way to connect to AWS, and has a Java service running that puts the data into Hadoop.

Read more at How a pharmaceutical supply chain company is taking advantage of the Internet of Things

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BROWZ Launches New Software Platform for Improved Supply Chain Management

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Speaking to a full house at the BROWZ Client Summit 2016 Sundance Resort, V.P. of Product Development, Aaron Rudd stated “BROWZ OneView is a significant development in the evolution of supply chain management software that will not only meet our clients needs today, but will meet their supply chain needs as they expand in the future.”

BROWZ OneView is an entirely new interface and user experience for BROWZ clients.

“Our goal was to enhance the way our clients interact with our solutions and their supply chain. From conducting a simple supplier search to in-depth analysis across a global supply chain. BROWZ is empowering our clients with the new OneView platform,” Rudd said.

“The software provides meaningful insight into the entire supply chain using key performance indicators which also provides the flexibility to analyze the performance of individual locations or specified risk level with the click of a button.”

Read more at BROWZ Launches New Software Platform for Improved Supply Chain Management

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