The full report, entitled On the Trail to Traceability, can be downloaded by clicking here.

RedPrairie commissioned Gateway Research to survey supply chain and operations executives from 130 consumer product goods, life sciences, and food and beverage companies to identify their confidence and capabilities in effectively tracking, tracing and recalling products up and down their global supply chains.

Additional findings include:

• More than half of executives are concerned about their ability to isolate items with their own supply chain.

• Coordinating recall issues with suppliers and distributors is a real concern for almost 70 percent of executives surveyed.

• Only 51 percent of organizations are able to execute a product recall within hours.

• Less than 20 percent have deployed traceability technology solutions to help fully-automated trace and recall processes.

• Forty-six percent say their companies are struggling to stay compliant with regulations.

• Almost one-third of executives were most concerned that their ineffective ability to trace items would have a negative financial impact on their company. Almost 25 percent of them also cited negative brand reputation as a pressing concern.

• Eighty-six percent are worried about their financial liability if something goes wrong with a product recall process.

"Costing on average $10m, product recalls are understandably any company's worst nightmare," said Simon Ellis, practice director, Supply Chain Strategies for IDC Manufacturing Insights. "New legislation adds increasing complexity to the challenge of successfully executing traceability programs. Technology solutions that help to isolate products, proactively issue alerts and handle inventory reconciliation will be key to avoiding the negative outcomes of a poorly executed recall."

A recent videocast of RedPrairie experts analyzing and discussing the report's findings with analyst Ellis can be accessed by clicking here.

Source: RedPrairie