logistics

All too often, when companies buy and implement supply chain software, you hear a similar story: the implementation took longer than planned and the company grossly underinvested in training. Also, the needed software customization made future upgrades costly and time consuming to the point where upgrade cost and effort often rivaled a brand new implementation. [...]

Let’s go straight to the news… SAP Unveils Accelerated Cloud Strategy LeanLogistics Introduces On-Demand TMS® SuiteApp For NetSuite’s SuiteCloud Computing Platform FedEx Closes in on Vehicle Fleet Fuel Efficiency Goal Years Ahead of Schedule FMCSA Releases New Shipper, Broker, and Insurer Resources USDOT Proposes Groundbreaking Rule to Prevent Rollover Crashes for Nation’s Large Trucks, Buses [...]

Many companies are being pushed, or pulled, by their customers to improve the environment impact of their supply chain. Large global retailers are under pressure from consumers and in turn they are demanding their suppliers abide by more stringent green requirements. The website mnn.com gives business owners some ideas how make their supply chains greener.

• Reduce Energy Usage - How many businesses leave lights on unnecessarily, or have ill fitting warehouse doors? By switching off items not being used, even small items, the energy savings can be significant in a large facility.
• Alternative Fuels - Businesses can reduce their carbon footprint by using hybrid or alternative fuels as well as save money. Warehouse forklifts and short haul delivery vehicles can be compressed natural gas (CNG) or electric to reduce greenhouse gases.
• Environmentally Sustainable Purchasing - A business can quickly become "greener" by ensuring that their own supply chain has vendors who have a good environmentally record.

Read more about the green supply chain here. Follow me on Twitter

Top 5 signs it is time to switch carriers:

1.  Financial Warning Signs

With many carriers reporting first quarter losses in 2012, now might be a good time to check the financial health of your current carrier.  While a one-time quarterly loss isn’t a reason to immediately run for the exits, a string of quarterly losses most likely has deeper considerations than just the state of the global economy.

2.  Uncompetitive Rates

Let’s face it, it is always easier to stick with an incumbent provider than bringing in a new partner.  The reasons are many, including I.T. connectivity, customer service and sales familiarity, and knowledge of your business to name a few.  However, if your current carrier is simply not market competitive it might be time to either have a rate conversation or take your services out to bid.  The term uncompetitive will largely be defined within your own corporate culture and how much you are willing to spend to remain with a company that provides good service is a personal decision.  It is not always about the lowest rates…just market competitive rates for a fair competitive service.

3.  Service Standards 

With many carriers offering similar services (ie moving boxes from A to B), one huge differentiator is the level of service that is provided by your carrier.  If the level of customer service offered by your incumbent carrier has slowly deteriorated over the course of your business dealings, it might be time to shop for a carrier that is eager to provide you with stellar service.  Also pay close attention to the level of support you are offered from a commercial perspective.  There is something to be said about having consistency in sales support.

4.  I.T. Dark Ages

In today’s modern world, knowledge is power, and no more so than in today’s competitive supply chain environment.  The days of monitoring your supply chain via spreadsheets are over.  If your carrier does not have the tools necessary from an I.T. perspective to assist in managing your business on a day to day basis, then it is time to take a look at alternate options.  One of those options might be to research connectivity options with your carrier through a third party supply chain platform.

5.  Internal Changes

As your company (hopefully) grows, it is important that your existing carriers grow with you.  If you have outgrown the service capabilities of your carriers, whether it is in I.T. requirements or shipment volumes, then now is a good time to start identifying any current shortfalls.  Once identified, start looking for ways to address those needs in preparation to take your supply chain to the next level and increase your competitive advantage.

Rollover crashes in trucks and buses cause the greatest number of fatalities and injuries. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has proposed that all new trucks and buses should be fitted with an electronic stability control system (ECS) that will sense when a driver loses control and automatically applies the brakes to individual wheels to keep the vehicle stable and avoid a rollover. This type of system is required in passenger cars, sport utility vehicles and light trucks, as of the 2012 model year, but has been available in SUV's and many other cars for years. The stability control system would help commercial drivers avoid skidding across icy or slick roads or keep control when swerving to avoid an unexpected object in the road. In addition the individual-wheel braking system counters over-steering and under-steering in trucks. Research into electronic stability control systems by the government concludes that up to 56 percent of rollover crashes each year could be prevented, which equates to 2,329 crashes, reducing up to 858 injuries, and preventing between 49 and 60 fatalities a year. Read about commercial vehicles here. Follow me on Twitter

Last week, I attended Manhattan Associates’ Momentum 2012 conference. The theme of this year’s conference (its largest ever with more than 1,000 attendees) was “Platform Payoff”– a continuation of the “Platform Thinking” message the company introduced two years ago. Now that Manhattan (an ARC client) has about 200 customers live on its platform solutions, the [...]

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are weighing in on the issue of companies that want to use nanoparticles in their packaging of food stuffs. A nanoparticle is generally considered to be less than 100 nanometers in diameter, 1000 thinner than a sheet of paper. Some nanoparticles are being found in FDA regulated products such as sunscreen and skin lotions. The FDA have now issued guidelines to food manufacturers indicating that they will need to provide additional data establishing the safety of any packaging that would contain nanoparticles. Some companies are currently studying whether nanotechnology can be used in packaging to identify when food has spoilt or to even stop food from spoiling. The most popular area of nanotechnology for packaging involves polymer-clay nanocomposites, which embed nanoparticles of volcanic ash into plastics. These materials provide a barrier that can be used to keep carbon dioxide and nitrogen in a package, while keeping oxygen out, thus prevent oxidation and extends the shelf life of food. Other nanoparticles can remove oxygen from inside food packaging, and silver-based nanoparticles have also been proven to kill microorganisms, including some pathogens. Read about Nanoparticle safety here. Follow me on Twitter

India is preparing itself for a bumper crop this year and with that news comes a problem. The Food Corporation of India (FCI) has publically raised concern that there is not enough warehousing space to store the 12 million tonnes of food grain that will be arriving during the first week of June. The FCI believe the main storage shortages will be in Punjab, Haryana, and Madhya Pradesh. The food grain has been purchased by a government procurement program that is operated by the FCI. The corporation buys the grain at a fixed price plus any relevant bonuses, so the FCI knows how much grain will be arriving at its depots. The Indian government must act in some manner to stop the purchased grain from sitting in substandard storage or even out in the open. The government could distribute food grain to the poor, export some grain, or provide temporary storage before the June rains begin. Follow me on Twitter

I attended RedPrairie’s RedShift user conference last week in Hollywood, Florida (RedPrairie is an ARC client). There were over 1,000 attendees, the company’s largest event ever. Several high-profile customers were prominent in this year’s proceedings, including Walmart that uses RedPrairie’s store execution products; Kraft that spoke on its implementation of RedPrairie’s flowcasting (demand sensing) and [...]

How would you feel if your garbage bin charged you each time you threw in a bag of household waste? Well don't get too comfy because Earth911 is reporting about a new scheme in South Korea that uses RFID in a rubbish bin to weigh the waste put in it and then inform the depositor of the fee. The Korean government estimates that the nation of 50 million creates 170,000 tons of food waste daily at a cost of $1.5 billion annually. The government is aiming to reduce waste by twenty percent and this is where the new rubbish bin from SK Telecom comes in. The new RFID enabled bin was displayed at an RFID show in April. The bin is opened when a user taps their public transportation card and they can deposit their waste, which is measured to the nearest gram. The RFID bin then reports the weight of the waste to the user along with the appropriate fee for disposal. The future for RFID rubbish bins could be rosy as the country is running out of landfill. Could they appear in the US or Europe? Read more about RFID here. Follow me on Twitter

This was a busy week for supply chain and logistics conferences, with Manhattan Associates, RedPrairie, and Transplace (among others) holding events this week. With 52 weeks in a year, why cram so many industry events into a single week? I still can’t figure it out, but we’ll share our takeaways from the events we attended [...]

Running any ERP system can be a costly business. There is the cost of the software, the cost of the consultants to implement it, and the on-going maintenance costs so that you actually achieve the benefits of having an ERP system. But those support costs can be significant and in times of economic slowdown's ERP maintenance is high cost to be carrying. SAP, Oracle and the other large ERP vendors charge as much as 22 percent of the initial software price per year for maintenance, but there are vendors out there that say that they can supply just as good service at a much lower price. Denver-based Spinnaker and Las Vegas-based Rimini Street are two companies that offer a wide range of support for ERP systems at a lower cost. Just recently Spinnaker has started offering SAP support to complement its support offering for JDEdwards. Spinnaker and Rimini Street could be the way forward for many companies that find themselves in a situation where they need to find cost savings in IT without affecting performance and the business. Currently Spinnaker and Rimini Street have a small percentage of SAP users as clients, but if they can prove that their solution is just as good at a much lower cost there is no reason why more companies would not jump on-board. Read more about SAP here. Follow me on Twitter

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Zepol Reports April Vessel Imports Rise 9.2% Vessel imports show large increases for the second consecutive month

MINNEAPOLIS, May 10, 2012 — Zepol Corporation, the leading trade intelligence company, reports that U.S. import shipment volume for April, measured in TEUs, increased 9.2% from March and 7.2% from April of 2011. So far for this year, April has shown the highest number of TEU imports, with over 1.52 million TEUs imported, and the second largest number of shipments, with 756,000 processed. Although April imports are high, summer numbers may get higher; the trend for the past five years has shown further increases in May as well as spikes in July and August.

Key Statistics from this Month’s Update:

U.S. imports from China, measured in TEUs, increased in April by 18.7% and are up from April of 2011 by 6.1%. Hong Kong also had a dramatic increase in TEU imports by 22.4% from March. Total imports from Europe were down 3.1% from March with its largest U.S. exporting country, Germany, down 5.9% and Belgium, Europe’s third largest exporter, down 16.2% in April.

Nine out of the top-ten U.S. ports saw increases in TEU imports in April. The Port of Los Angeles rose 14.7% from March imports and 2.2% from January’s high numbers. The Port of Savannah had the largest TEU increase of the top-ten U.S. ports at 17.7%; Savannah also posted its largest TEU numbers since September of 2011. The Ports of Newark and New York combined posted an increase of 11% in April.

The majority of Vessel-Operating Common Carriers (VOCCs), increased in April from March. At the top of the list was Maersk Line, which rose by 19.4% from March. The number two VOCC for April was the Mediterranean Shipping Company which increased by 2.5%. Of the top-ten VOCCs the largest increase was seen by APL Group, which had a 20.5% rise in April TEUs.

Methodology:

Zepol’s data is derived from Bills of Lading entered into the Automated Manifest System. This information represents the number of House manifests entered by importers of waterborne vessel goods. This is the earliest indicator for trade data available for the previous month’s import activity. The data excludes shipments from empty containers, excludes shipments labeled as freight remaining on board, and may contain other data anomalies.

About Zepol Corporation:

Zepol Corporation is a Minnesota-based company working to provide the most complete and up-to-date U.S. trade data through our subscription tools. TradeIQ™ is a U.S. Customs import Bill of Lading database utilized to find information about competitors, suppliers, prospects, and the products that they use, market, or transport. TradeView™ provides U.S. Census data to visualize the U.S. import and export market. ComplianceIQ™ is a comprehensive tool that proactively alerts users of essential U.S. import trade compliance information.

Click here to download the PDF version of this release

Cori Rogers Marketing and Business Development Associate Zepol Corporation cori.rogers@zepol.com Tel: 612.455.9699 www.zepol.com

Read our trade data blog: www.zepol.com/blog

Follow Zepol on Twitter: @ZepolCorp

Is onshoring more than just media hype? The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) believe so and with the release of another report on US manufacturing they estimate that by 2015, China's cost advantage will have shrunk to the point that manufacturers will consider opening new plants in the USA. There are two main drivers for this opinion; firstly that the wage demands from skilled Chinese workers will continue to increase and minimize the delta that Chinese salaries have over US wages. Secondly if the cost of shipping from China to US and Europe continues to increase the costs will reach a point that no longer benefits Western manufacturers from having production in China. The benefits of moving manufacturing back to the US include the higher productivity and higher quality of finished products. However if Chinese manufacturers can both increase productivity and produce quality products such as Japan, the US will lose the advantage and China will continue to retain or even increase the number of manufacturing jobs. Follow me on Twitter

Earlier this year, I put together a short list of “Big Box” retailers to evaluate for an upgrade to my entertainment system. As I visited each retailer and discussed my criteria and timeframe with them, it became very clear that two of the three retailers did not have a true end-to-end supply chain visibility solution [...]

I’m too busy (in meetings, on the road, dealing with operational issues, sifting through countless emails and voicemails…) to invest time in leadership development and learning. Sound familiar? Over the past year, I’ve spoken to many supply chain and logistics executives about leadership development and learning, and “lack of time” is by far the most [...]

The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) expects manufacturing revenue to increase 4.5 percent. The report from the ISM expects sixteen out of the eighteen industries to increase their growth for 2012. For non-manufacturing industries the predicted growth is even higher at 4.8 percent. Capital investment in manufacturing is expected to reach 6.2 percent this year and manufacturing prices could rise as much as 2.3 percent, while for service industries prices could increase by 2.6 percent. Production capacity in manufacturing is expected to increase 5.2 percent this year, with fourteen industries expecting expansion in capacity. Despite the expectation of increases this year, operating rate is still only 81.6 percent of normal capacity. Follow me on Twitter

One of the biggest challenges to large-scale mobile rollouts is consistent use by the workers in the field. Unfortunately, it’s not unusual to hear that companies have mobile initiatives that are struggling or stalled because they cannot get their mobile workers or drivers to consistently use their mobile applications. While as leaders and managers we [...]

A little nervousness can probably be felt in the boardrooms of pharmaceutical companies around the world after the Indian government decided to issue a compulsory license for an Indian company to manufacture a patented drug. The drug in question is Nexavar, a drug for drug approved for the treatment of primary kidney cancer and early stage liver cancer. The compulsory license allows Natco Pharma based in Hyderabad, to manufacture a generic version the drug, but must sell the drug at no more than 8,800 Rupees ($161 USD) for a months supply. The price that the patent holder, Bayer, was charging in India was 280,428 Rupees ($5,156 USD) for the same month's supply of the brand name drug. The Indian government has defended its decision to issue the license to Natco, saying that under the World Trade Organization (WTO) agreement it could issue a compulsory licensing of a patented drug to ensure availability of patented drugs at affordable prices. The issuing of the compulsory license has led Mumbai based, Cipla, who manufactures a generic version of Nexavar, to lower the price of its product as well as other generic drugs that it produces. The US is worried about intellectual property rights (IPR) deficiencies in India and is hoping for an effective system in India for protecting against unfair commercial use. Follow me on Twitter

If you were hired as the top Supply Chain Management executive at a company, what would be your top three initiatives to improve the company’s capabilities? Here is my list: 1.   Get the right people on board! You can’t accomplish anything else if you don’t have the right talent. The toughest part of the job [...]