World Trade - October 2008 - (Page 33)

SUPPLY CHAIN SURVIVAL GUIDE I partners partnerships are there for the long term.” There’ There’s a strong reason for this approach. believe Andreae believes that innovation “tends to come from agi more nimble, agile small companies.” Even if the big vendors are dominant in ERP solutions for ﬁnancial transactions, with the right architecture “there’s the potential for other solutions to plug in (to their platforms).” That’s especially true for “unique work ﬂows that require speciﬁc needs,” he adds, explaining that in their case it’s a focus on spare parts planning. To accomplish this level of forecasting, particularly globally, requires “a system with advanced capabilities that can deal with large global networks and create optimization across multiple echelons.” For example, MCA Solutions provides the technology to assist Cisco Systems with the support contracts it offers its customers. Cisco ensures that if something breaks anywhere worldwide it will be fixed “in two to four hours,” Andreae explains. With this level of complexity, he says traditional supply chain software “doesn’t ﬁt. We’ve developed a very unique software to forecast extremely sporadic demand that will optimize the inventory mix across a global network.” He predicts that the market will demand “a single platform like SAP globally because they’ll have had their own experiences of SAP in individual countries.” But he also envisions “open opportunities for other vendors to ﬁt into (SAP’s) global infrastructure.” Then there are the solidly niche players who are hold- ERP or Full Service Model? Look at the Vendor! As in any technology purchase, Tim Andreae, senior vice president of global marketing for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based MCA Solutions, says decisions need to be driven by business needs and technical functions. Before jumping into the ERP camp or a full-service model, he says make sure the vendor has the following: • a deep understanding of your business problem and a willingness to work with you to develop the right solution; • successful references in your industry and implementations in an environment like yours; • a compatible architecture with your ERP platform; and • a willingness to model your environment with their product that uses real data and helps develop business cases. ing their own against the ERP big guns with offerings that are highly specialized. IES Ldt. offers end-to-end transportation logistics software solutions, but is also focusing on assisting international trade customers coping with a growing number of industry regulations such as U.S. Customs and Border Patrol’s “10+2” rule. According to Andrew Bullen, IES founder and president, the vendor is having “its best year ever” by helping customers “reduce costs while simultaneously streamlin- WTM08084Gtnexus1.indd 1 WWW.WORLDTRADEMAG.COM 7/14/08 2:58:06 PM 33 http://www.gtnexus.com http://WWW.WORLDTRADEMAG.COM

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of World Trade - October 2008

World Trade - October 2008 Contents Tune Up Your Supply Chain Globalization: The Real Competitive Threat Supply Chain Watch Tradewinds Shippers and Providers Collaborate to Take on a Challenging Economy Tweaking the Supply Chain to Optimize Value and Minimize Cost Supply Chain Software Morphs Into Enterprise Management Can Warehousing Really, Truly Be Strategic? Everybody is Global Between the Devil and the Deep The Hidden Costs of ‘Free’ Translation Blowing Smoke

World Trade - October 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.