Supply chain management should yield far more than cost reduction. It should result in delighted customers, marketing flexibility, and enhanced innovation and speed of doing business across multiple processes around the world. While traditional operations improvement has focused on how to reduce cost without sacrificing service, supply chain leaders have linked their business strategy to their supply chain strategy with dramatic results. Boston Strategies International helps companies achieve supply chain leadership by addressing complex challenges that can have many possible answers. Our work is more thorough than other consulting firms and we use appropriate tools at lower cost to deliver pragmatic, actionable recommendations regarding global supply chain strategy, merger & acquisition advisory, capital investment evaluation, market entry & exit strategies, risk mitigation strategies, supply chain technology strategies, policy planning, and world class supply chain organization development.
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| Contracting in a Volatile Market (2009 Strategic Sourcing Study)
Volatile oil prices have wreaked havoc up and down the supply chain for oilfield equipment, indicating the need for new supply agreement methods to balance this risk. Boston Strategies International used a supply chain simulation model to quantify how much value is lost when the price of oil spikes and freefalls. Part of the answer is political in nature, but equipment buyers and suppliers can mitigate the problem through “very long term contracts” (VLTCs) that share risk and maximize flexibility. VLTCs require a different way of looking at the buyer-supplier relationship and flexible mechanisms such as indexation of cost and prices, layering of incremental requirements onto a base load, and providing the option to reserve capacity.
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| The New Era of Post Chinese Sourcing
The extraordinary economic circumstances of 2008 conspired to vastly reduce the economic benefit of sourcing from China. Moving forward, the emerging economies of India, Brazil, and Russia present increasingly attractive sourcing locations for importers in the Middle East, North America, and Western Europe. Today, however, most Western companies are unfamiliar with sourcing from these new locations. Position yourself for the post-China trading environment, it w by establishing supply lines to qualified partners in the next tier of emerging economies.
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| Good Better Best
In everything we do we try hard to achieve excellence, and we are usually quite proud of our results. Yet no matter how much we work at something, our first attempt is usually only “good.” If we try harder, longer, and smarter, we can usually do “better.” Once in awhile, if we try as hard as we can and show great patience and respect for our subject, we can achieve “best.” This same story applies to our jobs in supply chain management.
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Supply Chain Strategy
| Supply Chain Strategy
Supply chain management should yield far more than cost reduction. It should result in delighted customers, marketing flexibility, and enhanced innovation and speed of doing business across multiple processes. While traditional operations improvement has focused on how to reduce cost without sacrificing service — reducing inventory without sacrificing service levels, reducing fixed cost by planning and scheduling work better without creating backlogs or bottlenecks, and lowering transportation cost through win-lose negotiations with carriers and 3PLs — supply chain leaders have linked their business strategy to supply chain management with dramatic results.
Price: $700
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Supply Risk Management
| BONUS: Supply Risk Management
While many purchasing groups have reduced the number of suppliers they buy from and increased the average length of contracts, few of them base have much forward visibility into the markets in which they are taking such positions. Making long-term commitments without corresponding market analysis is perilous, since market prices may swing above or below today's levels and the longer the agreement, the greater the possible budget variance. This presentation will examine how leading companies use forecasts and market outlooks to make long-term decisions that involve investment and risk.
Price: Free with purchase of Supply Chain Strategy
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| BONUS: Supply Chain Strategy Videocast
Supply chain management should yield far more than cost reduction. It should result in delighted customers, marketing flexibility, and enhanced innovation and speed of doing business across multiple processes. While traditional operations improvement has focused on how to reduce cost without sacrificing service — reducing inventory without sacrificing service levels, reducing fixed cost by planning and scheduling work better without creating backlogs or bottlenecks, and lowering transportation cost through win-lose negotiations with carriers and 3PLs — supply chain leaders have linked their business strategy to supply chain management with dramatic results.
26 minutes ©2008 Boston Strategies International
Price: Free with purchase of Supply Chain Strategy
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What's your Middle East Strategy?
Emerging markets such as China, India, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia have dominated the headlines due to their strong growth, and while they are suffering the effects of the recession their growth has been relatively less affected than major industrialized economies. This view often ignores the Middle East, which is on its own path toward being a third major economic pole.
Click here to learn more about economic growth in the Middle East.
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| Intermodal Integration: Responding to Market Needs
Global markets have no tolerance for delays, disconnects, or mistakes. Intermodal linkages are often examples of these problems because the problems and gaps between their different networks and approaches come together in high relief. For this reason, shining a spotlight on intermodal connections can reveal waste and inefficiencies that extend throughout the supply chain.
Price: Free
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Supply Chain as a Geopolitical Weapon
| Supply Chain as a Geopolitical Weapon
Bangkok is growing to be a major transport hub for Asia, and new infrastructure projects across Thailand are improving land access. What role will Bangkok play as a transportation hub in Asia? This presentation will explore Thailand as an emerging strategic location, in the context of a more encompassing and provocative theme — can governments use supply chain management as a competitive weapon to accelerate regional growth?
Presented to 4th Thai Ports Conference, 2007.
Price: $400
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| Aligning Goals for Supply Chain Success
Superlative supply chain performance is directly tied to the alignment of goals and objectives up and down the value chain. The tighter the linkage, the more performance the supply chain delivers. Knowing the key leverage points and what targets to set is critical to long-term success.
Price: Free
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| Focusing on the Right Suppliers
Companies have been consolidating their supplier base for more than 15 years. But, if you think they’re done tightening that core group, guess again. Some have chosen that emphasis in order to leverage the purchasing power of multiple new acquisitions; others are using it to restore or increase profitability to acceptable levels following the recent recessionary period. Regardless of the cause, the trend is hard to ignore.
Price: Free
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| On the Cutting Edge of Strategic Sourcing (2004 State of Strategic Sourcing Study)
Transportation and logistics companies are reducing their use of auctions by 45%. Paper companies are negotiating long-term agreements. 20% more than other companies. Consumer goods companies are purchasing in consortia 25% more than other companies. Which tools and techniques are you emphasizing, and why? This study examines how senior procurement executives at over 100 companies, of which over 20% are in the Global 1000, use 13 sourcing strategies, and which ones will they emphasize over the next four years. Over 60% of the participants hold Vice President or Director-level procurement positions.
65 pages, 39 charts/tables/diagrams, 10 chapters + self-assessment, ©2008 Boston Strategies International
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| The New Face of Purchasing
The coming decade promises to be a transformative one for the purchasing function. According to a major new study of over 350 global executives, after years of being perceived as a clerical, back-office function, purchasing is set to gain remarkable prominence in the corporate pecking order. Three external and inter-related forces are driving the elevation of purchasing: globalization, cost pressure, and innovation. This white paper identifies four ways in which the procurement function will respond and adapt between now and 2015.
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| Personalization
Any color as long as it’s black,” said Henry Ford in 1908. Supply chain management has totally changed that paradigm, not only producing any color that customers want, but offering the instant flexibility that allows them to generate more sales and profit. David Jacoby, President of Boston Strategies International, wrote this white paper for the Economist Intelligence Unit. Click here to request this paper from the publisher.
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| Innovation
Innovation used to be the job of the Research and Development department, but engineering improvements are of little value if they don’t reach the market in a timely fashion. Today supply chain managers are an integral part of innovative companies’ business strategy. David Jacoby, President of Boston Strategies International, contributed to this white paper for the Economist Intelligence Unit. Click here to request this paper from the publisher.
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Designing Sourcing and Logistics for Flexibility and Innovation
| Designing Sourcing and Logistics for Flexibility and Innovation
Flexibility has emerged as the differentiator in network designs, supply chains, and customer relation management and designing a flexible product has become strategically advantageous, especially when outsourcing to an off-shore location. Why is flexibility so important? This presentation will examine supply chain flexibility imperatives and what you should do to design flexible supply chains.
Presented to MBC, 2006.
Price: $400
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Logistics of Global Outsourcing
| Logistics of Global Outsourcing
What is the best approach toward operationalizing low-cost country sourcing? How do you evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of major ocean shipping lines, ports and inland service providers. Should you work with agents, brokers, and other intermediaries to achieve logistics service objectives? This presentation offers a five-step approach for successfully integrating logistical considerations such as the availability, cost, and service of transportation and logistics services, into off-shore sourcing decisions.
Presented to NESCON, 2005.
Price: $200
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The Crossroads: Global Trade and Technology
| The Crossroads: Global Trade and Technology
For 40 years, a dearth of reliable information constrained companies and consumers from achieving what they knew could be done. But today, information technology is making more data available than we know how to use, and with radio frequency identification we will soon have more data than our computers will be able to process. Concurrently, global trade is exploding and the locus of economic power is shifting. The convergence of these two trends over the coming 30 years will present unprecedented opportunities for trade and commerce. How can you take advantage of this opportunity? This presentation will identify key areas of commercial opportunity presented by these extraordinary trends.
Presented to Beverly Chamber of Commerce, 2006.
Price: $100
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| Customer Relationship Management
Gathering, managing, and using customer data at the right time is crucial to moving from a Stage II supply chain company to a Stage III supply chain company. It is easy to say but hard to do. David Jacoby, President of Boston Strategies International, wrote this white paper for the Economist Intelligence Unit.
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| How Will Western Manufacturers Survive? (2008 State of Strategic Sourcing Study)
At the current pace of off-shoring, Western manufacturing is arguably headed toward extinction. What should leaders of Western manufacturing companies do? Will your company survive? How should you reposition the core competencies and product range? Should you tap a non-home country national to run the company or establish multiple headquarters? What should the headquarters be? How can you recruit people who have the right language, culture, and skills to lead the company into the global future? Boston Strategies International's fifth Annual State of Supply Chain Management Study is focused on answering these critical questions.
32 pages, 26 charts/tables/diagrams, 7 chapters, ©2008 Boston Strategies International
Click here for free download.
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How Will Western Manufacturers Survive?
| How Will Western Manufacturers Survive?
At the current pace of offshoring, Western manufacturing is arguably headed toward extinction. What should leaders of Western manufacturing companies do? Will your company survive? How should you reposition the core competencies and product range? Should you tap a non-home country national to run the company, or establish multiple headquarters? Where should the headquarters be? How can you recruit people who have the right language, culture, and skills to lead the company into the global future? Boston Strategies International's fifth Annual State of Supply Chain Management Study is focused on answering these critical questions, © 2008.
Price: $500
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| How Will Western Manufacturers Survive? Videocast
At the current pace of off-shoring, Western manufacturing is arguably headed toward extinction. What should leaders of Western manufacturing companies do? Boston Strategies International’s 5th Annual State of Supply Chain Study is focused on answering these critical questions. In this videocast, we will reveal the findings of this study and offer career-defining recommendations to supply chain professionals.
39 minutes ©2008 Boston Strategies International
Price: Free with purchase of How Will Western Manufacturers Survive?
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| Can Western Manufacturers Beat the Competition?
At the current rate of outsourcing and off-shoring however, Western manufacturing is arguably in danger of being marginalized. Can Western manufacturers survive? This article in summarizes Boston Strategies International's position on the future of Western manufacturing.
Price: Free
To request this item, please click here.
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Please fill out the following form to request any of the available free research.
Materials in the Boston Strategies International Library are available to supply chain practitioners and policy makers.
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