Supply Chain Management Journal 2011, Volume 2, Number 1

Increased urbanization, aging population, increasing spread of wealth, increased impact of consumer technology adoption, increase in consumer service demands, increased importance of health and wellbeing, growing consumer concern about, sustainability, shifting of economic power , scarcity of natural resources, increase in, regulatory pressure, rapid adoption of supply chain technology capabilities, impact of next-generation information technologies generate the new objectives for supply chain management.
The next step in the collaborative process is to achieve alignment between the retailer and the manufacture partners on the targets, score and direction to follow, and the desired outcomes of the collaborative initiative. In the new generation of inter-organizational business model, we see collaboration evolving from the slow and linear collaborative planning, forecasting and replenishment (CPFR) model, and JAG model to a rapid-response, synchronous approach that proliferates multi-enterprise supply chain information to all partners in near real time.
A company can now achieve visibility into POS data from its customers, as well as planning, order and inventory information, so it can truly perform collaborative replenishment. A company can also closely collaborate with its suppliers by sharing inventory, order and capacity information.

collaborative business, value chain, future supply chain, working together, collaboration, consumer and shopper journey

June 2011, pp 1 – 12

This article presents the logistic support for the customer service logistics strategy in the trading enterprise. After presenting the most popular definition of logistics customer service and then a brief characterization of the enterprise, a further part of the article is dedicated to the customer service logistics strategy, which is used in the trading enterprise X.

logistics strategy, customer service, trading enterprise

June 2011, pp 13 – 19

Globalization is an evolving process, which in economic area has influences on all firm activities. In the logistic sector, these influences produce both good and bad consequences, which don’t mean they are absolutely appreciated by all parties involved in activities. In this context, appears and is increasingly manifested the global procurement concept. It works on policy at the regional, country, firm level resulting management changes. It changes the criteria by which decisions are made in the procurement management, but their order of priority.
It passes from the antagonistic relations to relations of cooperation with suppliers, leading to different characteristics. Invisible costs of procurement process are more and more involved in the purchasing decisions in detriment of the product purchase price. In terms of logistics, global procurement has an effect on different areas such as transportation, customs operations, warehousing, storage, etc. Increasing purchases from low procurement cost countries give rise to new distribution centres (with value added) in developed countries.

globalization, global procurement, supply chain, procurement management, purchases cost.

June 2011, pp 20 – 29

Nowadays, when the life cycles of products are shortening, demand for goods and services is changing fast and is hard to forecast, and companies are faced with constant competitive pressure, the factor of time has the new, important meaning for all activities in supply chains and their management. Time compression concept is one of the solutions in this case, while its usage in the supply chain allows not only for speeding up the response times and reduce the lead time, but also for reduction of cost in such supply chains.
The paper presents some chosen aspects of time compression theory at first. Then, there is shown the practical example of time compression in company manufacturing the steel constructions. The case study shows that time compression is possible not only by the speeding up the activities but also by removing some non-value adding activities.

time compression, supply chain, steel industry, company strategy, steel production process.

June 2011, pp 30 – 38

Today’s consumers demand choice and convenience. They “mix and match” channels according to their needs for product research, purchase and delivery. As cross-channel shopping behavior grows mainstream, the best way to evaluate and compare retail channels is to measure their relative impact increasing customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Customer satisfaction happens when the customer is satisfied with a product/service that meets the customer’s needs, wants, and expectations. To further understand customer satisfaction, we must take a deeper look at the levels of specific satisfaction. We must also recognize that there are levels of customer satisfaction that, in a sense, define the basic
ingredients of quality.
The value chain analysis pays a key role in understanding the need and scope for system competitiveness. The analysis and identification of core competences will lead the firm to outsource those functions where it has no distinctive competences.

consumer & shopper satisfaction, value chain, category management, store performance, shopper experience

June 2011, pp 39 – 47

Every business faces the question of whether to produce some products or service internally or to source it from an outside supply chain partner. Organizations are most successful when they focus on core competencies that differentiate from competitors and peripheral areas where they are less competent are best handled by others, specialized organizations. World-class logistics organizations also partner with strategic providers of various logistics services, including transportation management, transportation services, freight forwarding, customs brokerage, warehousing, logistics information systems, logistics exchanges, logistics application service providers, benchmarking, logistics consulting, and logistics professional education.
Outsourced logistics or third-party logistics (3PL) has the benefits of lower fixed costs, expert services, combined work giving economies of scale, matching capacity to demand, ability to deal with changing demand, increasing geographical coverage and
guaranteed service levels. This paper shows that today’s trend toward outsourcing will continue to gather steam and that, in the future, companies will outsource even more heavily in an attempt to transition as many fixed costs to variable costs as possible. This means that effective collaboration will be even more critical to success. Companies will need to be highly skilled at evaluating their prospective partners and identifying those with whom a relationship will result in the maximum economic value for each party. Logistics service providers and manufacturing outsourcers will expand their skill sets, helping their customers increase efficiencies while reducing labour requirements.
Transport is the most important logistic activity and organizations have choice between owning their own transport, using third-party carriers, or some combination of the two. The best alternatives depend on a number of factors, but there is a clear trend towards collaborative outsourced transport.

outsourcing, insourcing, supply chain, third-party logistics, transportation strategy

June, 2011, pp 48 – 58

These days, freight transport domain faces many challenges that need to be addressed using appropriate data. A changing regulatory and technological environment for logistics, energy, environmental and safety considerations, impacts on global
competitiveness, and the need to do more using fewer resources are some of the challenges. With the adoption of just-in-time supply chain management solutions, and increasing congestion on motorways, better knowledge of freight movements can serve to improve freight operations and planning. Considering the current advanced Intelligent
Transport Systems technologies and the large amount of high quality data available and improved collection methodologies, data mining software will produce results that reveal new information about the freight transport system. Data mining can provide information beyond the use of general statistical analysis, the original databases being used to derive various rules and patterns which could be applied to support decision-making. This information will be the key for better-managed freight operations and long-range planning and forecasting.

freight transport, data mining, intelligent transport systems, data sources

June 2011, pp 57 – 65

Mobile technologies and m-Business are considered the next innovation potential for organizations. Mobile technologies and applications are quickly finding their way into various supply chain management functions such as procurement, inventory management, package tracking and sales force automation. In this context, mobile computing is changing the way companies manage their entire business and mobile Supply Chain Management (mSCM) is fast gaining recognition as a major source of cost reduction and supply chain performance.
Therefore, this article attempts to provide some insights into the nature of mSCM and the application and implementation of mobile and/or wireless technology in SCM.Furthermore, this paper attempts to explore the chances and challenges of mobile technology for successful implementation of mSCM and provides an overview of how modern computing devices can support the expansion of a range of mobile solutions for SCM and how this will help business achieve total portability.

mobile Supply Chain Management (mSCM), mBusiness, wireless technology, mobile devices, ubiquitous network.

June 2011, pp 66 – 74