A new study, announced by Aberdeen Group finds that supply chain globalization, increased complexity, rising costs, and the need to respond rapidly to customer demand changes are forcing companies across industries to re-think their old approach to supply chain management. "The evolution of today's multi-tiered supply and demand networks is driven by the need to reduce costs and achieve long-term competitive advantage," says Viktoriya Sadlovska, research analyst who co-authored the report. "Our study shows that companies understand the new reality of today's business environment and are prioritizing multi-enterprise visibility and process collaboration to regain control over their extended demand and supply networks."

Best-in-Class differentiators in this study include the following process capability differentiators:

1. Clearly defined executive sponsor or champion for supply chain collaboration

2. Effective integration of trading partner data into internal processes

3. Effective supply chain partner collaboration across Sales and Operations Process (S&OP), customer demand forecasting, inventory management and invoice reconciliation

Nari Viswanathan, VP/ principal analyst, who co-authored the report, concludes: "Supply chain complexity has gradually led companies to lose visibility and control over their network-wide supply chain operations and performance metrics.

The report emphasizes that the flow of goods and services needs to be optimized simultaneously with the information and financial flows across multiple tiers of the network. Finally the report concludes by stating that visibility and responsiveness have become the necessary ingredients for success in today's multi-tiered supply-demand networks."
Aberdeen Group