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Supply Chain Management (SCM) can be divided into three main areas: purchasing,
manufacturing, and transport. From end to end, this includes decisions about which input
materials to use, production quantities, inventory levels, distribution network configuration, and
transportation for both the input materials as well as for the finished products. Logistics
Management is the component of SCM that focuses on how and when to get raw materials,
intermediate products, and finished goods from their respective origins to their destinations.
Today, international trade is commonplace and increasing market share in emerging markets is
highly desirable. It is therefore safe to say goods are rarely consumed where they are produced,
and transportation services are the essential trait dunion between all of the elements of the
Supply Chain. Effective, cost efficient Logistics Management can be a real point of competitive
differentiation. But how does a company achieve this?
To practice effective, cost efficient Logistics Management, an organization must lay the
foundation for a responsive, economical transportation network. With a responsive, economical
transportation network, an organization is able to implement major strategic changes to reduce
costs and increase customer service levels with very little disruption to the overall supply chain
flow.
A responsive transportation network begins with end-to-end network visibility. Visibility allows
the business to centralize production operations to lower-cost areas without impacting customer
service levels, because any uncertainty within the network can be monitored and appropriately
managed to keep inventory levels as low as possible.
An economical transportation network actually begins with a shift in attitude. Businesses are
often trapped in the traditional view that transportation is a necessary evil an inevitable source
of cost and risk. And who can blame them? Transport is by far the largest component of the
cost structure of a business logistics. According to sector research (Chang, 1998), transport
accounts for as much as 30% of the total cost of logistics operations almost as much as
Warehousing and Inventory together!
Now consider the impact of transportation activities on the overall economy of a country. The
numbers are impressive. In the United States in 2005, freight transport activities accounted for
10% of the GDP. In Germany alone, the Freight Logistics Sector (the largest in Europe) came in
third in total revenue (after retail trade and the automotive industry) with a whopping 170 billion
Euros, or 7% of the German GDP.
While the data certainly lends itself to the mindset that transportation is a cost albatross, if you
will, around ones neck, this attitude is rapidly changing. In fact, Supply Chain Managers who
are outpacing their competition have done so largely by acknowledging transportation as a ready
vehicle through which to drive cost savings and create value within the Supply Chain. How?
Technology, for one. More and more sophisticated tools allowing Managers to monitor, control,
and optimize transportation networks are available, and in the wake of the Cloud are available
with increasingly easy implementations.
That said, while a Bloomberg survey reports that 73% of Supply Chain Managers are undergoing
this shift in attitude toward transportation and identifying transportation as their key focus in
2014, the same survey also reported that the current adoption rate of transportation solutions is
somehow lagging with 46% of participants reporting current use of a solution, and another
22% reporting plans to adopt one in 2014.
The road ahead is therefore still long, but the systemic impact of transportation-related figures
clearly demonstrates that transportation is much more than just the financial drain associated
with trucks, pallets, and warehouses. When the appropriate tools to manage complexity and
guarantee visibility are in place, transportation provides an organization with the opportunity to
continuously create operational efficiency and improve the bottom line ultimately unlocking
previously untapped value for shareholders.
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Last week I attended Supply Fest 2014 at the British Museum in London. This supply chain
management conference considered two issues always at the forefront of operations: minimizing
cost and reducing risk. For effective supply chain operations, managers should tackle both
simultaneously. The host as well as the presenters did a great job of sharing compelling
information, answering questions, and maintaining a healthy level of audience engagement, so
full credit goes to them as well as to the team who put the event together. I noticed an
overarching theme was collaboration, and four key topics emerged as the day progressed:
Communication Real time information from all actors in the supply chain at each
touch point is critical.
Value and benefits versus effort and complexity Determining which supply chain
projects get priority is challenging.
Understanding the cost to serve Receiving early warnings if a shipment will not be
arriving on time is key to achieving desired results.
Eyefreight hosted a round table discussion, titled: The Biggest Bang for your Supply Chain SaaS
Buck. This discussion posed the questions:
Assuming some solutions have the ability to deliver wide reaching benefits to key
constituents within the Supply Chain while others often deliver less value and come with
higher risk, how do you determine where the right fit is for your organization?
I would like to thank everyone who chose to attend this discussion. The audience input
contributed to a very interesting outcome. I shared our findings on stage with the audience, and I
would like to share these with those who were unable to attend the event. Interesting to note,
these findings mirrored the topics mentioned above: communication, collaboration, and value
and benefit versus effort and complexity.
Communication
The idea of disparate silos of information was common to many companies, with many different
actors both inside and outside the organization needing to access key information information
that is often sent and received through email in the form of documents and spreadsheets.
Exacerbating this already painstaking communication process is a lack of integration. Legacy IT
systems, processes, and procedures that may have been right for the business in the past have not
evolved at the rapid pace of the marketplace and changing customer needs.
Visibility
Support strategic decisions with granular reports on logistics KPIs and LSP performance
Optimization
Collaboration
Co-shipping
To answer the question: Which applications are best suited for the cloud? Transport
Management Systems were identified as one of the best. The discussions revealed the
following:a really productive Transport Management System will have all of the transport
vendors connected, which is in line with most companies preference to avoid hundreds of
outside parties connecting into their internal systems. Furthermore, a SaaS product running
outside of the firewall is the best way to secure an organizations internal environment.
Therefore the most secure solution is a Transport Management Solution in the cloud.
Many participants agreed a system accessible by as many key actors (both inside and outside the
company) as possible enables a company to increase communication, better understand the true
cost of serving customers, and ultimately facilitate collaboration.
In summary, Transport Management Systems are the best place to start for a SaaS supply chain
solution.
THE ROLE OF TRANSPORTAT
ION IN LOGISTICS CHAIN
Yung-yu TSENG
PhD Candidate
5001 Australia
Fax: +61-8-8302-1880
Email: yung-yu.tseng@unisa.edu.au
5001 Australia
Fax: +61-8-8302-1880
Email: wen.yue@unisa.edu.au
Michael A P TAYLOR
Director
5001 Australia
Email: michael.taylor@unisa.edu.au
Abstract:
and transportation.
Key Words:
1.
INTRODUCTION
Since logistics advanced from 1950s, there were numerous researches focused
on this area in different applications. Due to the trend of nationalisation and
globalisation in recent decades, the importance of logistics management has
been growing in various areas. For industries, logistics helps to optimise the
existing production and distribution processes based on the same resources
through management techniques for promoting the efficiency and
delivery to the final consumers and returns. Only a good coordination between
each component would bring the benefits to a maximum. The purpose of this
paper is to re-clarify and redefine the position relationship between
expresses the benefits that transportation brings to logistics activities and vice
versa. For instance the increase of the efficiency of logistics also would best
read to release traffic load in the urban areas. Furthermore, some major
logistics activities and concepts were also discussed in this paper. It especially
presents City Logistics independently due to it is considered as a main
tendency and an available method of future integration of transport and
logistics in the urban areas. Finally, this paper will discuss and conclude the
potential further development of logistics systems.
2.
OVERVIEW OF LOGISTICS
2.1
Definitions
definition (cited in Tilanus, 1997) uses five important key terms, which are
logistics, inbound logistics, materials management, physical distribution, and
supply-chain management, to interpret.
Logistics describes the entire process of materials and products moving into,
through, and out of firm. Inbound logistics covers the movement of material
received from suppliers. Materials management describes the movement of
materials and components within a firm. Physical distribution refers to the
movement of goods outward from the end of the assembly line to the
customer. Finally, supply-chain management is somewhat larger than logistics,
and it links logistics more directly with the users total communications
network and with the firms engineering staff. The commonality of the recent
definitions is that logistics is a process of moving and handling goods and
materials, from the beginning to the end of the production, sale process and
waste disposal, to satisfy customers and add business competitiveness. It is the
process of anticipating customer needs and wants; acquiring the capital,
materials, people, technologies, and information necessary to meet those
needs and wants; optimising the goods- or service-producing network to fulfil
customer requests ; and utilizing the network to fulfil customer requests in a
timely way (Tilanus, 1997). Simply to say, logistics is customer-oriented
operation management.
2.2
Without well developed transportation systems, logistics could not bring its
advantages into full play. Besides, a good transport system in logistics activities
could provide better logistics efficiency, reduce operation cost, and promote
service quality. The improvement of transportation systems needs the effort
from both public and private sectors. A well-operated logistics system could
increase both the competitiveness of the government and enterprises.
3.2
Transportation plays a connective role among the several steps that result in
the conversion of resources into useful goods in the name of the ultimate
consumer. It is the planning of all these functions and sub-functions into a
system of goods movement in order to minimize cost maximize service to the
customers that constitutes the concept of business logistics. The system, once
put in place, must be effectively managed. (Fairet al., 1981) Traditionally these
steps involved separate companies for production, storage, transportation,
wholesaling, and retail sale , however basically, production/manufacturing
plants, warehousing services, merchandising establishments are all about
doing transportation. Production or manufacturing plants required the
assembly of materials, components, and supplies, with or without storage,
processing and material handling within the plant and plant inventory.
3.3
The role that transportation plays in logistics system is more complex than
carrying goods for the proprietors. Its complexity can take effect only through
highly quality management. By means of well-handled transport system, goods
could be sent to the right place at right time in order to satisfy customers
demands. It brings efficacy, and also it builds a bridge between producers and
consumers. Therefore, transportation is the base of efficiency and economy in
business logistics and expands other functions of logistics system. In addition, a
good transport system performing in logistics activities brings benefits not only
to service quality but also to company competitiveness.
4.
4.1
Supply Chain Management (SCM) is the concept for handling the production
procedures in broad sense. An effective SCM application could promote the
industry to satisfy the demand of new business environment. Ross (1998)
defined SCM as a continuously evolving management philosophy that seeks to
unify the collective productive competencies and resources of the business
functions found both within the enterprise and outside in the firms allied
business partners located along intersecting supply channels into a highly
competitive, customer-enriching supply system focused on developing
innovative solutions and synchronizing the flow of marketplace products,
services, and information to create unique, individualized sources of customer
value.
and transport
analyzed the three elements of SCM supply chain business processes, supply
chain management components, and supply chain network structure.. It
displays the details of the whole processes from purchasing, management,
production, and distribution to customers. The information flow is like an
individual system to link the whole supply chain from supplier and
manufacturer to consumer. Unimpeded information flow could increase the
operation accuracy for costs saving and promote the competitiveness of firms.
The product flow proceeds through the whole production processes from
material supply via manufactories till providing the finished products to
consumers. The items in vertical direction show the various management tasks
within the supply chain. Particularly, the return flow, or reverse logistic, is one
of the elements in the system but with converse direction from the others.
Discussions
Conclusions
(3) Since transportation contributes the highest cost among the related
elements in logistics systems, the improvement of transport efficiency could
change the overall performance of a logistics system.
(4) Transportation plays an important role in logistics system and its activities
appear in various sections of logistics processes. Without the linking of
transportation, a powerful logistics strategy cannot bring its capacity into full
play. The review of logistics system in a broad sense might help to integrate
the advantages from different application cases to overcome their current
disadvantage. On the other hand, the review of transport systems provides a
clearer notion on transport applications in logistics activities. The development
of logistics will be still vigorous in the following decades and the logistics
concepts might be applied in more fields.