Demand Solutions recently released a white paper on managing inventory for optimal advantage (registration required) that overviewed 10 common inventory mistakes and how to correct them. Of these, the following five can cost an organization dearly if not corrected. Forecast Management without a Process All stakeholders have to agree on the process and the forecast that results and someone needs to own the process to insure it’s implemented properly. Otherwise the budget will be padded and the end result will be obsolete inventory and associated …
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June 13th, 2010 | Posted in Forecasts, inventory
… and its effects that can be very detrimental to your inventory levels, associated costs, and overall supply chain revenue, don’t do any of the following: Second Guess the System and Overcorrect This typically happens when a buyer orders early, thinks he needs more “just in case” inventory, or believes that the system has under-estimated inventory requirements. When this happens at each stage of the supply chain, the original order requirements end up increasing significantly. For example, if a buyer at a retail store …
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May 2nd, 2010 | Posted in Forecasts, Supply Chain
In Part I, we re-introduced you to MCA Solutions, a Philadelphia, PA company that specializes in after market service (and service parts) optimization, and noted that they were still going strong despite some recent shake-ups in the market (and the noteable acquisition of Servigistics and Click Commerce by Marlin Equity Partners, who also acquired Emptoris not too long ago). We noted that, in addition to completing a strong SAP integration, they’ve also added a considerable amount of new functionality in the last two years around reporting, plan analysis, and reporting management. Since we covered their new reporting and plan …
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April 11th, 2010 | Posted in Decision Optimization, Forecasts, Services, inventory
MCA Solutions, a Philadelphia, PA company that specializes in after market service (and service parts) optimization, is still going strong despite the recent struggles of a few of its direct competitors (namely Click Commerce and Servigistics who were recently acquired by Marlin Equity Partners). If anything, the recession (although it did considerably lengthen the sales cycle) only bolstered the need for after market service (as no one could afford new equipment) and optimization thereof (as everyone is strapped for cash and every penny counts). As I indicated in my first post on MCA Solutions and their strategic service …
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April 9th, 2010 | Posted in Decision Optimization, Forecasts, Services, inventory
SYSPRO is an established ERP suite provider (that has been around for over 30 years) that also provides Forecasting, Inventory Optimization, and Warehouse Management solutions in addition to the 40+ other modules that it provides. The Inventory Optimization solution (in SYSPRO 6.1) is one of their newest offerings. It’s built on top of their solid forecasting module and provides SMBs with a good inventory management and optimization solution, especially if they are already running SYSPRO. While SYSPRO (a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner) isn’t an Oracle or SAP, they are a fairly significant company in the mid-market with over …
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April 7th, 2010 | Posted in Forecasts, Technology, inventory
As a precursor to my future post on SYSPRO’s new Inventory Optimization solution, I thought I’d provide a brief review of their free e-book on Supply Chain, Inventory Management, & Optimization: Skills for Small Businesses, available on request to clients and prospects. While it doesn’t delve deep into inventory (and related supply chain) optimization, it does a great job describing the basics of inventory management and serves as a great introduction to the subject to small and mid-size businesses just beginning to tackle the issue. When beginning to delve into the issue of inventory management, there are five …
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April 5th, 2010 | Posted in Forecasts, Technology, inventory
Share This on Linked In A recent article on CFO.com on imperfect futures, which discussed the great deal of uncertainty in today’s economy and how hard forecasting has become, contained a novel and often overlooked idea for creating more accurate forecasts (on average). See how much your people will bet on [...]
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August 17th, 2009 | Posted in Forecasts, inventory
Share This on Linked In A recent article in i2’s Supply Chain Leader on how resilient companies can manage demand when the past is not a reliable indicator of the future had a great table that compared and contrasted demand tactics and strategies in stable vs. volatile economies that did a great [...]
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July 28th, 2009 | Posted in Forecasts, Strategy
Share This on Linked In A good article from last year’s Intelligent Enterprise covered six steps to better sales forecasting and demand planning. The process, which should revolve around the four critical components of people, process, information, and technology at its core, is straight-forward and a good guide for any organization that [...]
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July 28th, 2009 | Posted in Best Practices, Forecasts
Share This on Linked In A classic article in the Supply Chain Management Review discusses the hierarchy of supply chain metrics because measurement is the cornerstone of operational success. According to the article, which builds on AMR Research, the best approach to measurement uses a three-tiered hierarchy that allows managers to [...]
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May 28th, 2009 | Posted in Finance, Forecasts, Supply Chain
