Unchained: why digital platforms in supply chain are a game changer

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Disruption is the new normal to global supply chains (iStock)

Logistic Reply is a Business Reporter client.

Supply chain disruptions are a major threat to business. In fact, they’re the key risk to companies, according to IFRIMA (International Federation of Risk and Insurance Management Associations).

That is because global supply chains, built for efficiency and with a long-standing focus on cost and time savings, have revealed themselves to be extremely fragile.

Infrastructures that support global supply chains are devised for a stable context, (in terms of climatic, epidemiologic and geopolitical scenarios), but with the evolution of risks, new investments are necessary, not only in efficiency. After 30 years of trying to make the global supply chains as lean as possible, the case for savings, efficiencies and just-in-time strategies no longer stands.

“The global supply chain is too long,” says James Rickards, bestselling author of SOLD OUT: How Broken Supply Chains, Surging Inflation and Political Instability Will Sink the Global Economy.

In recent years, disruption has become “the new normal”. With complexities ranging from the pandemic and the war in Ukraine to raw materials shortages, supply chains have been brought into the spotlight more than ever in the past few years. The focus is now on juggling a multitude of issues, ranging from record inflation, radical shifts in demand, declining growth, bloated warehouses with inaccurate inventories and supply shortages.

Supply chain leaders are required to make decisions while facing extreme uncertainty, and are still expected to manage tight cost restrictions and fulfil customer expectations. How can businesses recover from these disruptions and thrive in an increasingly competitive and volatile market?

The key role of digital transformation and digital platforms

The pressure is on for enterprises to be adaptive and resilient and to scale their business quickly in the face of unforeseen supply chain challenges and risks. To achieve this, it is imperative to “unchain” from dated organisational and technological roadblocks and see technology as an enabler rather than a limitation. Enter digital platforms. Digital platforms are a combination of technologies on a cohesive underlying architecture to enable a company’s strategic and technological needs. Digital platforms are transforming the game, representing a new way of thinking about business processes and connecting ecosystem players.

Not any digital platform will do: enterprises should look for a modular, integrative and extensible technology platform. A digital platform that embraces what Gartner calls the “composable enterprise” model: a data-driven, end-to-end platform made of composable services, that can be packaged together, or integrated with other software, ERPs or technologies, to perform any supply chain operation.

LEA Reply™ is a modular digital platform for supply chain, that includes pre-built solutions, such as the award-winning LEA Reply™ WMS, as well as providing a library of business-ready services and accelerators to quickly add or create new solutions as business needs and technologies change.

So how do digital platforms unlock new business opportunities from disruptions?

Resilience and flexibility

Disruptions such as the Covid-19 pandemic have created both challenges and opportunities for companies. For example, the acceleration of e-commerce, while generating new business opportunities, also requires dynamic fulfilment, delivery and return models to be implemented alongside existing operative processes.

A digital platform allows a step-wise approach to implement new processes without adding additional systems and complexity. Logistics Reply, the Reply Group company specialising in providing solutions for digital supply chains, was approached by a large do-it-yourself retailer to help expand their e-commerce processes. The client needed a high level of adaptability to manage both B2B and B2C operations, from small to large warehouses as well as in-store environments. The LEA Reply™ Platform provided the building blocks to compose a tailored solution to support these diverging needs, rather than offer a one-size-fits all approach.

Personalisation

In a market space filled with countless products and alternatives, businesses must put customers at the centre to remain competitive. It’s the experience, where convenience, personalisation and flexibility are key, that truly gives value to the customer.

Retailers have started adopting new fulfilment models and offering more delivery/pickup options, such as home delivery, click-and-collect and drive-through models, and are considering predictive and forecasting models, to adapt quickly to customer demand. However, traditional one-size-fits-all technologies fail to support these customer expectations. To leverage an omnichannel model, retailers need to build an ecosystem of partners and suppliers, enabled by an agile supply chain digital platform.

Logistics Reply partnered with one of the largest retailers in the US and the world, to support their omnichannel proposition and vision. The LEA Reply™ digital platform gives them access to a plethora of services for multichannel fulfilment, drop-shipping, in-store picking and more, for all their sites and locations around the world.

Automation and smart working models

High labour costs and talent shortages are urging companies to seek flexible automation solutions and integrate smart technologies.

In this context, digital platforms act as a stepping-stone to enable a continuous evolution path, allowing organisations to integrate innovative technologies and help them achieve their digital roadmap objectives.

Logistics Reply partnered with a tech scale-up in the retail sector, specialised in automated micro-fulfilment to achieve same-day delivery in city centres, to enable a whole new end-to-end solution for warehouse automation. Thanks to the LEA Reply™ digital platform, which leverages APIs and integrates seamlessly with the customer’s software environment and robotics, Logistics Reply can guarantee the agility and scalability necessary for fast, flexible and efficient fulfilment and deliveries.

Control tower for supply chain visibility

Disruptions are usually sudden and unexpected, and companies have to act quickly to mitigate critical issues, shortages and delays and minimise impact on the business.

This is especially relevant in the parcel delivery market, where speed is crucial. Logistics Reply worked with a major player in this sector to provide a solution to enable real-time tracking of information on traffic, unforeseen order volumes, machine malfunctions, and more to provide proactive advice for the client to react to any issue in its network and empower real-time decision-making.

A digital platform such as LEA Reply™ enables end-to-end visibility into the supply chain and allows for proactive decision-making for mission-critical business processes.

Want to discover how you can leverage the power of LEA Reply™ for your business? Find out more at lea-reply.com.