The financial aspect of the supply chain is an often-neglected topic when discussing supply chain management. It is left only to the financial department, and everyone else forgets that the whole organization depends on it.

In most companies, supply chain finance is seen as a narrow and limited tool rather than a strategic enabler of success. As a result, a lot of unrealized value is left on the table. Whether you are in finance, supply chain, or procurement, supply chain finance has the potential to help you provide more strategic value.

Deutsche Bank has rolled out the Financial Supply Chain Manager with multi-currency and multilingual capabilities that enable clients to access receivables finance and supplier finance solutions via a central access point.

Supply chain finance has continued to exhibit strong growth in the last two years, according to latest research from Demica, which reveals average annual SCF growth rates between 30 percent and 40 percent at major international banks. The SCF market is expected to continue to expand strongly to the end of the decade, although the pace of growth will moderate to 20 percent to 30 percent a year by 2015, and 10 percent a year by 2020.