A recent survey of Supply Chain Professionals reveals numerous strategies used by companies to manage their supply chains on a global basis, the survey identified ten major trends that are driving innovative supply chain design and configuration across all industries:

1) Globalization is accelerating, which is leading to large structural shifts for global supply chain organizations and new challenges to successfully manage supply chain performance. While past globalization initiatives focused on manufacturing and assembly, future globalization will also target product and technology development.

2) There is considerable external and internal pressures to reduce cost as well as penetrate local markets, which are the two key drivers of accelerated globalization.

3) Considering that significant cost reductions per globalization initiative of approximately 20% many companies have difficulty realizing savings in management costs. The gap between benefits is caused by internal barriers that prevent full support of globalization efforts, and external network partners that fail to achieve expected performance.

4) China and India continue to emerge as major targets for globalization, while Eastern Europe is catching up as a top offshoring destination.Investments in North America and Western Europe also remain strong as companies look to secure access to local markets and key resource.

5) Product safety and quality, as well as supply chain delivery and security, are the most critical concerns when expanding the supplychain globally.

6) Barriers to globalization include limited supply chain flexibility and the lack of internal competency to manage partners. Better visibility and management across the supply chain are important keys to overcome these barriers.

7) Environmental sustainability is a key consideration in the development of future globalization strategies. Today, sustainability is mainly driven by the need for regulatory compliance and satisfaction of customer demand. It is not yet considered a strategic differentiator.
8) Supply chain maturity acceleration enabled by advanced supply chain practices, appears to have reached a plateau. Among those surveyed, supply chain maturity differs significantly across geographic regions and industries.

9) The need for greater supply chain flexibility will overtake product quality and customer service as the major driver for improving supply chain strategy. Many supply chain leaders have developed effective strategies to improve global flexibility.


10) The COO agenda across industries and geographic regions is converging on improving supply chain flexibility and performance.Companies around the globe face similar challenges in building effective international operations and supply chain networks.

Supply Chain Experts can help your organization improve efficiency through improved warehouse organization.

Dr. Edward F. Knab
Productivity Constructs, Inc.
800 660 8718 office9
49 413 7333 mobile
ed@edwardknab.comwww.productivityconstructs.com

Dr. Knab is an academic practitioner and seasoned Global Supply Chain expert whose company, Productivity Constructs, is focused on driving cost and inefficiency out of the Global Supply Chain. Dr. Knab can be contacted for speaking engagements, coaching, or consultation at efk@productivityconstructs.com, ed@ewardknab.com or www.edwardknab.com.