Supply chains multiple

The multiple supply chains used by pharmaceutical companies can be bewildering, sometimes leading to the genuine product landing up in a market for which it is not intended. 

Benchmarking analysis is fraught with issues. Companies are not simple. They have multiple supply chains. The markets are dynamic. Companies are bought and sold. Product lines evolve. Channels ebb and flow. As a result, while companies want to benchmark and insights can be gained, definitive answers remain more of an art than a science. 

To illustrate these points, let s take a closer look at a specific industry—consumer products—and the dynamics of its nnderly-ing value network. The consnmer value chain is composed of many companies. It stretches from the consumer through a network of retailers, mannfactnrers, and suppliers. Other industries—transportation, third-party logistics firms, freight forwarders, and marketing agencies—play snpporting roles. It is not linear. Instead, it is a network of hnndreds of companies. Each company within the chain operates multiple supply chains. The industry has worked hard to be collaborative however, today few interactions are truly collaborative. They lack alignment and a win-win value proposition that can sustain the test of time. 

Bottlenecks occur when alimiting resource affects the outputlevel ofthe entire system. The business-customer Web site encounter as shown in Figure 6 is one such bottleneck Here, multiple customers search multiple supply chain data sources, for their individual needs and business inefficiencies arise. Finch (2003) suggests bottlenecks may be considered as business constraints. 

The reality of multiple supply chains has been recognized. Section 4.4 described 16 supply chain models that make up what researchers call a supply chain spectrum. Each supply chain in the spectrum has evolved in response to differing industry environments. Perhaps a single eompany will have more than one type in the speetmm. The quote above from consulting firm A.T. Kearney argues that most companies will need more than one supply ehain. As eompetitive pressures increase, a one-size-fits-all approach will not work. 

A company with multiple supply chains, such as those tailored for multiple spheres, can use one model in one supply chain and a different model in another. This approach is justified by competitive strategies tailored to different product-market combinations, a purpose of process design for different spheres. 

Enable processes address resources that can be shared among multiple supply chain spheres. Examples are various types of facilities, the transportation network, distribution centers, contracted service providers, metrics, information systems, and preferred suppliers. 

Figure 24.6 combines a number of useful bottom-up tools for flowcharting physical flow in the supply chain. First, it relies on industrial engineering symbols for Operation, Transport, Inspection, Storage, and Delay process steps. Second, the format uses what is called the swim lane or cross-functional presentation to show the roles of multiple supply chain... 

The network should be evaluated using multiple supply chain performance metrics that include supply chain profit, risk, and responsiveness. 

The cross-enterprise processes involve multiple companies in the executirui of supply chain processes. The important feature of these collaborative processes is that the companies involved are mainly concerned with their inter-conununications rather than with internal operations of each supply chain imit. That simplifies development and execution of complex supply chain processes. The cross-sectional processes involve multiple supply chain problem areas such as sales, purchasing, and logistics. This characteristic implies that supply chain decision-making and process execution cannot be done in isolation and mutual interactions and dependencies among different problem areas should be taken into account... 

The challenge to logistics management is to create appropriate supply chain solutions to meet the needs of these ditferent value segments. More than likely there will be the need for multiple supply chain solutions since one size will not fit all . This issue will be dealt with in detail in Chapter 5 where the concept of supply chain agility is discussed. 

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