As companies expand their sourcing and sales operations, they are put under significant pressure to deliver the right product at the lowest price with the most innovative materials produced by ethical and responsible suppliers into the waiting hands of customers at the expected time. This is the formula for success in today’s environment.
The reality of global sourcing is that you are working with many different outside sources. The communication is usually on many levels and with various people in multiple time zones and geographies. It is hard to maintain consistency and truly grasp the complete process. In many cases you are working with these vendors via paper, email, and phone. This can be a daunting and complex process leading to errors which in turn can become financial issues.
Globalization has further intensified the need for supply chain collaboration, which can be defined as standardizing and sharing information across the enterprise along with every key trading partner. To gain a competitive advantage, retailers and consumer goods brand owners sourcing from regions all over the world need to implement technology to help manage the entire product development lifecycle and supply chain execution.
These solutions make possible dramatic changes by improving collaboration among the distinct internal and external groups, standardizing processes and documents, and acting as a central knowledge base to store and share all related data from a range of systems to provide visibility at every stage along the way.
The benefits of a solution like this accrue at both the top and bottom line, including:
To do it right, organizations need to take a holistic, integrated approach that encompasses product development, sourcing optimization, supplier management, product and factory risk, and quality assurance with visibility at every step of the way. We offer companies solutions across three primary functional areas with our Amber Road Supply Chain Collaboration platform.