Supply Chain Transformation

The key factors for building a competitive and stable supply chain in the future are resilience, transparency, automation, flexibility and regionalisation. They are essential criteria for a strategic realignment of the supply chain and make an important contribution to its long-term success.

Resilient supply chains that are as transparent as possible must be created in order to enable rapid reactions to disruptions and optimise value creation networks. The optimisation of resilience is essentially based on the more agile design of organisations, the decentralised set-up of supply chains, the creation and use of redundancies, the diverse design of the working environment and the permanent stimulation of learning processes. This reduces dependencies and improves flexibility, but increases transparency requirements.

Smooth cross-functional and cross-company collaboration along the entire supply chain network requires holistic transparency across the end-to-end supply chain. The entire company and supply chain structures and their processes should be mapped and networked in real time using digital tracking tools and KPIs. Through suitable supply chain management and monitoring, reliable forecasts can be made for increased responsiveness, risks can be prioritised and identified and quality and supplier standards can be ensured.

The digitalisation or automation of processes is crucial for creating transparency and optimising workflows. Innovative digital technologies such as data analytics, blockchain, AI or RPA make a significant contribution to improving process efficiency and effectiveness along the supply chain and enable better adaptation to the new reality.

Flexibility stands for transparent, networked and resilient processes along the supply chain that improve the ability to act and react to changing conditions. Strategies for dealing with risks are defined at an early stage, agility is promoted through investments in data and technologies, customer-oriented strategies are developed and good cooperation and communication with supply chain partners is ensured.

Establishing a regional supply chain network can help to increase flexibility and transparency and minimise risks. Local production and supply chains ensure greater and faster delivery capability thanks to shorter transport and delivery routes and minimise susceptibility to disruptions. The reduced dependence on global supply chains and shortening of the supply chain lead to less complexity and greater risk diversification. Regardless of the positive aspects of regionalisation, the following generally applies: a lean but diverse supplier and supply chain network should be established in order to reduce or proactively avoid supply chain disruptions and conflict costs.