Supply Chain refers to the system of organization, people and the activities which is involved for moving a product or a service to customer. The activities relayed to supply chain can change the natural resources and the raw materials into that of the finished product which can be delivered to end customer (Childerhouse, Aitken and Towill 2002). Supply Chain strategy refers to an iterative process that helps in the evaluation of cost-benefit trade off in relation to operational components. This essay discusses about the evolution of supply chain selection and evaluates the strategies in relation to supply chain strategy. This essay elaborates on how the emergence of technology has made supply chain vulnerable in the present age.
The era of the 1940’s made use of mechanization that involved pallet lifts for improving labour intensive process in relation to material handling. The concept of “Unit load” was greatly popular at this stage and the 1950’s gave way to the concept of transportation management that involved the ships, trains and the trucks. A trend had come up in the 1960’s that shifted the time-dependent transportation to that of truck instead of rail. This paved the way for joint consideration pertaining to warehousing, freight transportation along with material handling (Christopher and Towill 2002). Before the era of 1960, the transactions along with record keeping were carried out manually. A lot of change was brought about in 1980 owing to the emergence of the personal computers. This helped in the aspect of providing better computer access to the planners along with graphical environment in relation to planning. This gave birth to new technology that included the flexible spreadsheets along with map-based interface. This paved the path for huge improvement in relation to logistics planning. Logistics boom had been fuelled in 1990 on account of the arrival of the Enterprise Resource Planning systems. This system was motivated owing to the success of Material Requirements Planning systems owing to the desire for integration of multiple database (Hbr.org 2018). There were some significant problems in relation to the ERP systems but by the end of the year 2000 most of the companies had made installation of ERP systems. The ERP system acted as a great improvement in relation to data availability along with accuracy. The ERP software increased the need of better planning along with integration pertaining to the logistics components. This gave birth to the emergence of “Advanced Planning and Scheduling” software (Godsell et al. 2011). The technology that is made use of in the current age in relation to supply chain strategy is automated identification technology.
Automated Identification helps in describing direct entry of the data within the computer system. The technologies that are involved includes Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) along with Bar Coding. The bar codes act as the items of the information which is in codified form that is readable with the help of a scanner. RFID system helps in allowing the aspect of non-contact reading that can prove to be effective in relation to manufacturing where the bar codes were unable of surviving. Global complexity in relation to supply chain management has made it difficult for organizations to deliver the quality goods within time. Reliability pertaining to supply chain can be improved by the increasing of visibility pertaining to goods scattered within the network. Global Positioning System (GPS) can provide the managers with the optimal capabilities that can help them in managing the operations (Godsell et al. 2006). It can be useful in the aspect of route visibility, cargo tracking and fuel cost tracking. Drone delivery can help in enhancing the customer service in the present age. The drones can act as a supply chain tool that can go beyond that of residential delivery. The drones can help in increasing the aspect of supply chain visibility. The driverless vehicles have made major advances in the last decade. Driverless system makes use of short along with longer-range radar which can offer help in relation to supply chain management (Lee 2002). The driverless trucks will give rise to legal issues that will act as a barrier in relation to supply chain strategy. Evolution pertaining to supply chain management has led to the movement towards the system of supplier relations over that of national boundaries and into the other continents. The firms have achieved economies of scale in the present age that helps them in internationalising business for finding lowest source of the inputs. The modern age of technology has given birth to integrated supply chain that gives competitive advantage to the actors participating within the chain. A switch has been made from that of firm competition to that of chain competition in the present age (Sindi and Roe 2017). Functional products refer to the basic products that have predictable demand along with low profit margin. These products require supply chains that are efficient which helps in minimizing the aspect of cost. Innovative products on the other hand have have unpredictable demand along with shorter life cycle. Innovative products can create high profit margins. The unpredictable demand of innovative products makes the managers consider the aspect of supply chain.
The recent technologies like Bar Coding and RFID possess high cost of capital and it may not be feasible for a small firm. Lack of the factor of hardware interoperability acts as a limiting factor in relation to implementation of RFID (Carter, Rogers and Choi 2015). There are some products like the liquids that interferes with transmission of electromagnetic waves to that of the terminals that paves the path for “bad read” of the data. Global Positioning System (GPS) may have problem in transmission of satellite signal. In the event of the signal being disturbed location of product within the transit will not be known. Accuracy of the signal can be questioned and this is a drawback of technological developments in relation to supply chain strategies. GPS is capable of tracking the location of a product up till a certain range inspite of the innovations made in the field of GPS technology (Rajeev et al. 2017). The limitations of information technology poses threat in relation to supply chain strategies. The technological advancements have made it difficult for the older generations to adjust to the new standards along with applications. The difficulty posed by information technology is due to the fact that it requires expertise of the individuals for understanding complexities in relation to the system. This process involves a lot of time, energy along with money that has a bad effect on the aspect of supply chain management. Technological development gives rise to complexity in relation to supply chain strategies because firms have to calculate whether benefits outweigh costs (Monczka et al. 2015). Privacy is an issue in relation to supply chain strategy in the present age of technology. The rise of internet can lead to the stealing of information and this is a real risk in relation to supply chain management.
Conclusion
Supply Chain is indicative of system of the organization and the people that helps in moving a product to the customer. The activities related to supply chain can transform the natural resources into the finished product which has to be delivered to end customer. The age of 1940 took recourse to mechanization that helped in improving the labour intensive process. The emergence of Enterprise Resource Planning paved the path for logistics boom. ERP helped in improving the factor of data availability. The software paved the path for better planning and helped in integrating logistics components. Automated Identification helps in the aspect of entry of the data in that of the computer system. The bad impact of technology on supply chain strategies is due to the fact that Bar Coding along with RFID has high cost of the capital that may not be possible for a small firm. Hardware interoperability can act as limiting factor pertaining to implementing of RFID. GPS can face problem in transmitting the satellite signal. GPS can help to track location only till a certain extent that is a limitation of technological advancement on the supply chain strategies.
References
Carter, C.R., Rogers, D.S. and Choi, T.Y., 2015. Toward the theory of the supply chain. Journal of Supply Chain Management, 51(2), pp.89-97.
Childerhouse, P., Aitken, J. and Towill, D.R., 2002. Analysis and design of focused demand chains. Journal of Operations Management, 20(6), pp.675-689.
Christopher, M. and Towill, D.R., 2002. Developing market specific supply chain strategies. The international journal of logistics management, 13(1), pp.1-14.
Godsell, J., Diefenbach, T., Clemmow, C., Towill, D. and Christopher, M., 2011. Enabling supply chain segmentation through demand profiling. International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, 41(3), pp.296-314.
Godsell, J., Harrison, A., Emberson, C. and Storey, J., 2006. Customer responsive supply chain strategy: an unnatural act?. International Journal of Logistics: Research and Applications, 9(1), pp.47-56.
Hbr.org 2018. What Is the Right Supply Chain for Your Product?. [online] Harvard Business Review. Available at: https://hbr.org/1997/03/what-is-the-right-supply-chain-for-your-product [Accessed 11 Oct. 2018].
Lee, H.L., 2002. Aligning supply chain strategies with product uncertainties. California management review, 44(3), pp.105-119.
Monczka, R.M., Handfield, R.B., Giunipero, L.C. and Patterson, J.L., 2015. Purchasing and supply chain management. Cengage Learning.
Rajeev, A., Pati, R.K., Padhi, S.S. and Govindan, K., 2017. Evolution of sustainability in supply chain management: A literature review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 162, pp.299-314.
Sindi, S. and Roe, M., 2017. The Evolution of Supply Chains and Logistics. In Strategic Supply Chain Management (pp. 7-25). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
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