Finding the Value of Mobility in the Supply Chain

As a participant in the recent Technology Association of Georgia (TAG) Supply Chain & Mobility Panel, we talked about the benefits of deploying mobile capabilities in the supply chain.

The audience was comprised of Atlanta-based supply chain practitioners. I was invited to share my perspective from a data collection, collaboration, order fulfillment perspective in the distribution center, as well as from the back of the store omnichannel perspective. The audience had questions:

  • What are the benefits?
  • What does the ROI look like?
  • How do I get buy in from my peers and management?
  • Once I begin the project what are some caveats/gotchas I need to pay attention to?

Then I fielded a really interesting query: Why do we have to do mobility in supply chain? Who cares? What is the real value? Click on the video below to hear my response:

Now, in this venue, I want to take a step back and open up a broader discussion. To understand the evolution of mobility, we need to take a step back and peruse the history of technology progression. At first, big companies used mainframe computers to process payroll, manage accounting transactions, and run enterprise processes. Next, people adopted PCs, which allowed everyone more productive because they had access to computing power right on their desk. Next, client-server technology connected everybody back to the mainframe and backed server through a console to offer the power of the mainframe combined with the ease of use of a personal workstation. The Internet connected everyone and created huge benefits. People, seeing the possibilities, bought and sold things and merchants, seeing demand, hopped on board. Now, people are spending time on their mobile devices (and less time with their PC’s).

Businesses are beginning to recognize the shift. One company in India, Myntra was purchased by Flipkart and moved all of its activities to a mobile platform, even shutting down its traditional web site. Now, the Flipkart has followed the same path and announced that it will shut down its own web site in the next year. The migration to mobile is in full swing.

Look around and you’ll see evidence of this movement everywhere. People check their mobile device as they sit in cafés, wait for an elevator, or sitting in a meeting room.  They are surfing the web, answering email, running reports and more. Retailers have realized that if they want audience for their wares, they need to invest in mobile apps. And the phenomenon is spreading to every nook and corner of the world including enterprises, supply chains, and distribution centers.

Mobility remains as a way the organizations are differentiating their offerings with their customers and potential customers.  It’s a popular move whenever it clearly makes life easer, lets workers be more effective, and pushes work to be more productive. Think about it: 80% of the emails that are sent out today get read in a mobile device first, so making sure the information is readable and usable in a mobile footprint is critically important.

Of course, you have to understand the pain point that a mobile app or device can solve in your specific scenario (the time of technology for technology sake is long gone). You have to clearly articulate the value of the app or device to the user. In the end, though, the decision is now whether or not to go mobile, but whether to be a leader or a follower of this trend.

Let us know what you think about the usefulness of mobile applications and devices for logistics and the supply chain the comments section below.

Originally published at Smartgladiator.com on Feb 28, 2018.

28
Aug 2018
By Puga SankaraComments Off on Finding the Value of Mobility in the Supply Chain
Author:
Puga Sankara
About:
Puga Sankara is the Founder, CEO of Smart Gladiator LLC. Smart Gladiator designs, builds, and delivers market-leading mobile technology for retailers, distributors, and 3PL service providers. So far, Smart Gladiator LoadProof has been used to ship, receive, and scan more than 100 million boxes. SG LoadProof is a patent pending Centralized Enterprise Photo/Video Document System on Cloud for Supply Chain. SG LP is built on the fact that photos & videos are vital docs as important as POs/SOs/Legal Contracts/Fulfillment Orders that reside in ERP/WMS/TMS systems, that serve as compelling, conclusive, unequivocal proof of crucial, critical, vital operations executed in Supply Chain within/across orgs when fulfilling customer orders as well as meeting contractual obligations between orgs as merchandise is transferred between different parties that partake in Supply Chain functions & operations. And these photos/videos data should not be stored in someone’s Smartphone or Email Inbox or in their personal/work Computer, but should be stored in a Centralized Enterprise system, where such data can be pushed into super-fast, stored securely, accessible to all stake holders (CFO/Sales Reps/Customer Support/AR/AP) in an org, as well as facilitates super-fast retrieval/sharing. LP is an Enterprise System of record for Photo/Video docs & is as important as an ERP which is an enterprise system of record for POs, SOs, Legal Contracts between parties etc. that have huge legal ramifications, also as important as a WMS (Warehouse Management System) that hold indispensable shipment & fulfillment data on orders. Like how Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat etc. have evolved into social media platforms/systems that enable individuals to showcase their beauty/pretty clothes/lovely cosmetics/hep coolness etc., LoadProof is an Enterprise system that holds similar photos/videos, but for a different reason, not for show off, but to serve as compelling, conclusive, unequivocal & indisputable system of record and proof that can be presented even in the court of law, when there is a dispute between parties while they execute many facets of the Supply Chain functions & operations. SG LoadProof is also an Enterprise System of Record for Photos, videos and any other digital documents for your Supply Chain Network. A system of record (SOR) or source system of record (SSoR) is a data management term for an information storage system (commonly implemented on a computer system running a database management system) that is the authoritative data source for a given data element or piece of information. The need to identify systems of record can become acute in organizations where management information systems have been built by taking output data from multiple source systems, re-processing this data, and then re-presenting the result for new business use. In these cases, multiple information systems may disagree about the same piece of information. These disagreements may stem from semantic differences, differences in opinion, use of different sources, and differences in the timing of the extract, transform, and load processes that create the data they report against, or may simply be the result of bugs. The integrity and validity of any data set is open to question when there is no traceable connection to a good source, such as a known System of Record. Where the integrity of the data is vital, if there is an agreed system of record, the data element must either be linked to, or extracted directly from it. In other cases, the provenance and estimated data quality should be documented. The “system of record” approach is a good fit for environments where both: 1. there is a single authority over all data consumers, and 2. all consumers have similar needs Here, LoadProof is the System of Record for pictures and videos for all the entities in Supply chain who uses pictures and videos to track using any Supply Chain System infrastructure. 1. LoadProof provides accurate, thorough, complete, and latest information in pictures and videos related to any entity in the Supply chain that is tracked. 2. LoadProof is the single authority on pictures and videos related to any entity in the Supply Chain that is tracked 3. LoadProof doesn’t let any external system to copy the records being stored in it, which eliminates the data being duplicated in multiple places to preserve the data integrity and credibility. 4. LoadProof has a secured login procedure which lets only users with select level access to view the data and modify the records which helps in maintaining LoadProof is becoming the Industry Standard System for Photo & Video Docs for Supply Chain Smart Gladiator is located in ATDC - Advanced Tech Dev Center (tech Incubator) in Georgia Institute of Tech. Click for a demo - https://loadproof.com/apply Puga is a supply chain technology professional with more than 25 years of experience in deploying capabilities in the logistics and supply chain domain. His prior roles involved managing complicated mission-critical programs driving revenue numbers, rolling out a multitude of capabilities involving more than a dozen systems, and managing a team of 30 to 50 personnel across multiple disciplines and departments in large corporations such as Hewlett Packard. He has deployed WMS for more than 30 distribution centers in his role as a senior manager with Manhattan Associates. He has also performed process analysis walk-throughs for more than 50 distribution centers for WMS process design and performance analysis review, optimizing processes for better productivity and visibility through the supply chain. Size of these DCs varied from 150,000 to 1.2 million SQFT. Puga Sankara has an MBA from Georgia Tech. He can be reached at puga@smartgladiator.com or visit the company at www.smartgladiator.com. Also follow him at www.pugasankara.com. [Read More]
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