Supply Flexibility

Within almost every product company, you will find people who believe that all would be well “if only we could create an accurate forecast.” While there are steps a company can take to improve accuracy, the reality is that the dynamic nature of the market in most industries makes it nearly impossible to create a flawless forecast. Your other leverage point is to make your supply chain more flexible so you can respond to unforecasted demand.Too often, the path to create “flexibility” involves adding various forms of buffer inventory. This might address the immediate need, but it does not make your company more responsive. In fact, the opposite effect can occur: Burdened with the extra inventory, you cannot respond as quickly to engineering changes, quality issues, or shifts in product mix. Our approach is to build true flexibility versus just buying inventory. We will assess your flexibility and inventory, and devise solutions that enable responsiveness without unnecessary inventory risk.

Examples of services we can provide:

• Perform analysis to provide leaders important information, product availability options and the impact on supply chain exposure, flexibility, and inventory risk
• Use analytical tools to identify high-leverage supply chains and devise strategies to increase flexibility and decrease inventory risks and components, and implement postponement manufacturing strategies
• Develop predictive metrics to show progress and drive long-term structural improvements
• Tailor specific solutions to meet business needs, given the realities of the current supply chain capabilities
• Provide insights into the health of a multi-tiered supply chain by deploying our proprietary “misalignments” metric to assess availability risk
• Provide key contract language and negotiations service to build robust flexibility into important supply agreements, especially for Contract Manufacturing