Elemica Blog

Solutions for Buyers and Suppliers for this Historically Challenging Raw Material

Natural rubber inventory management has long proved troublesome for buyers and suppliers alike. With production geographically dispersed from delivery locations, inventory management of natural rubber has had to confront long lead times, difficulties in tracking, and high operating costs.

Elemica has developed, in partnership with our natural rubber network, an inventory system which mitigates the problems of natural rubber distribution and offers key advantages over traditional inventory methods. Initially targeted towards Asia-Pacific, our inventory approach provides better inventory tracking and warehouse-to-factory distribution than is available with traditional methods. This service is delivered via Elemica's QuickLink Portal solution which provides access to Elemica’s network of buyers, suppliers, and carriers. Supporting multiple languages and currencies, Elemica's QuickLink Network allows our clients to expand their trading partner relationships and transact business globally.

Tags: Global Supply Management, inventory management, vendor managed inventory, supplier management, Global Inventory Visibility, Natural Rubber, QuickLink Portal Read More

Increasing the Benefits of your B2B Network

One of the key drivers of supply chain efficiency is the capability of one’s trade partners. Partner capability has many dimensions that may or may not directly impact the bottom line. It is important to understand the capability of your current network in order to identify areas for improvement in your supply chain.

Elemica’s QuickLink Portal provides you with the necessary visibility into your trade partner network. It employs “google-like” search capability across and into the network. Users can search for various attributes like region, process, transaction etc. in order to identify and hence rate their partners. This is an important feature in order to progress network expansion.

 

Tags: QuickLink, QuickLink Portal, B2B Integration, B2B Network, Supply Chain Integration, trading partner network, network capability, network expansion, trading partner discovery, trading partner activation Read More

EU Invoice Compliance

Elemica now offers its supplier management QuickLink Portal customers the ability to completely close the order-to-invoice loop with EU invoice compliance. Suppliers now have the opportunity to send an invoice from the portal - which will be EU-compliant - following all the stringent requirements which must be fulfilled to achieve compliance, including the application of a digital signature. A fully customisable PDF will be generated and sent to the buyer and back to the supplier for archiving purposes.

Tags: supplier management, electronic invoice, eInvoice, Invoice Management, QuickLink Portal Read More

Measuring Viability of a New Approach

2011 was a banner year for connecting customers with our QuickLink Email application. With a fixed resource base Elemica tripled production and cut the average time to connect customers by more than half. Functions were deployed that give CSR tools to speed up order processing. For example, if the system detects a new delivery address the CSR is notified in real-time and can quickly solve the issue in a matter of minutes.

In Q1 our Delivery Forecast solution is being updated to support detection of rush orders and provided instant alerting. Our Repeat Order Entry solution is also being updated to support just-in-time (JIT) replenishment.   

Tags: QuickLink Email, QuickLink, Sales Order Management, customer order form Read More

Road Transport Execution

 

There is a saying in London, that you seem to wait for ever for a bus and then three come along at the same time. It is feeling a bit like that in our Logistics Management suite, although it has not been long since the last bus filled up and moved out. In the past few months we have had three companies kick-off new projects to connect to logistics partners.

 

Automating the booking and visibility of road shipments has been on the agenda for 20 plus years. Most of the sizable logistics service providers have sophisticated systems capable of sending and receiving data.

Tags: Logistics, logistics management, time slot optimization, time slot booking, road transport execution Read More

The Secret to Quickly Automate Sales Orders Received Via Email or Fax

Since Elemica introduced QuickLink Email and QuickLink Print capabilities to support sales order management two years ago, many of our clients are in full-blown roll-outs to all of their customers who send them orders via Email or fax.  As a result, we’ve been able to gather a lot of operational information about how to best implement the solution while avoiding obstacles.And that’s the main theme of this article – getting superior sales order management results through fast implementation of this powerful solution.

Tags: Emailed orders, faxed orders, Sales Order Management, QuickLink ERP, QuickLink Email, QuickLink Print, QuickLink Read More

The Tricky World of eInvoices

Many of you think of Elemica as a provider of electronic purchase orders, confirmations, shipment notices, and order changes. However, we also get involved in helping our clients with electronic invoices – incoming and outgoing, as well as freight invoices from our client's logistics providers.

The US and Canada are fairly lucky in terms of eInvoicing requirements – all you need is a nicely formatted ANSI X12 810 invoice document, or the ChemXML or EDIFACT equivalent, and you’re good to go. In Europe and Latin America, however, things quickly begin to get very tricky.

Tags: customer management, eInvoice, supplier management, logistics management Read More

Elemica Launches our Newest Product Offering

 

 

As supply chain professionals look to manage the challenges of volatility, variability and complexity - while simultaneously dealing with the pressures of reducing costs, maximizing profit and maintaining customer service at desired levels - Transportation Management Solutions (TMS) become an increasingly strategic part of the toolset and support for collaborative processes becomes more essential.

 

According to Gartner’s recently published Magic Quadrant for Transportation Management Solutions (September 2011) over the next 12 months, cost increases and capacity constraints in logistics and transportation will require better collaboration between shippers and carriers as well as the need for shippers to likely increase the number of carriers they work with and support more sophisticated processes. This is expected to drive more deployments of TMS solutions as shippers seek to support these processes.

 

Elemica and our clients are no strangers to the benefits that can be achieved through collaboration.

 

Tags: logistics management, Transportation Management Solution, TMS, Elemica Transportation Management Solution Read More

Targeting a Level for Electronic Orders

These are the questions we often get from our customers; “What’s the industry average for electronic orders?  How high should I shoot with my plans for getting my customers on board with automated purchase orders, shipment notices, and invoices?”

The answer, as I’m sure you have already guessed, is “it depends”.  We see a huge variability in the percentage level of automated orders our clients have been able to achieve over their 10+ years on the Elemica network.

We did a survey recently of some of our largest and longest-standing clients, and we came up with the following table of automated order percentages.   Shown in the table are estimates of the percentage of total orders captured through an electronic channel (EDI, Storefront or Elemica), that is, all electronic orders. 

Tags: customer management, customer automation, QuickLink, QuickLink Print, QuickLink Email, electronic orders Read More

Badly Implemented Supply Chain Management (SCM) Projects by Customers in China are Major Challenges

Recent visits to China (including my presentation at ChemWeek Tianjin) combined with mainstream media reports of “re-shoring” actions are confirming my long held contention that poorly conceived or badly implemented Supply Chain Management (SCM) projects by customers in China are going to be major challenges to deal with in 2012.

For background, “re-shoring” means the shift in manufacturing assets or plant expansion activities from formerly low-cost countries (e.g. China) back to home countries (e.g. USA) due to increasingly higher labor rates in the former, skilled labor shortages and other cost and logistics reasons. These “left behind” plants must now rapidly shift their focus to capturing a domestic market demand with a SCM process geared for export.

So what’s the big deal?

Tags: Re-Shoring, Supply Chain Integration, Supply Chain Management, SCM, SCM Efficiency & Profitability, QuickLink, logistics management, supplier management, customer management Read More

Up to Triple Digit Growth in QuickLink Print and QuickLink Email

QuickLink Print and QuickLink Email growth continues to accelerate in all dimensions of adoption - comparing Q3 2011 to Q1 2011 - We see a 75% increase in the number of sellers using the solution and a 141% increase in the number of buyers.  

As we increase the number of suppliers and buyers using the system we are identifying additional opportunities to let us further increase thru-put.  Here are some changes we plan to roll out to increase rates of production and quality:

Tags: customer automation, QuickLink, QuickLink Print, QuickLink Email, customer management Read More

Two Secrets of Successful VMI Deployment

Vendor-managed inventory, or VMI, is an increasingly popular option for dealing with customers these days.  Many customers insist on doing business that way, and will simply seek out a different (more flexible) vendor if their current supplier can’t work with them in this manner. 

And yet, Elemica and our clients have seen several examples of failed VMI, or “fake VMI” where there is a system and business process in place, but it’s not really used at all.  The supplier makes up for the lack of a true VMI approach by simply throwing more inventory at the problem – which is inefficient, expensive, and flies in the face of using VMI in the first place.

But how can VMI disaster be avoided? 

Tags: VMI, vendor managed inventory, customer management, customer automation Read More

$30M of IT Infrastructure Built But Underused

 

As the great blues performer Elmore James stated, you have to shake your money maker. Or to be precise, in our context, shake your money saver. On a recent analysis of our QuickLink™ network we calculated that over $30million of IT infrastructure has been built and is being underused across various industries. As they say “if you’ve got it, flaunt it."

 

Why do some clients have hundreds of connections and some have a handful? It is not size, if you do a ratio of number of connections to annual turnover it is surprising how the numbers shake out. There are some thought leaders like BASF and Dow who come high on any score, but you would be surprised at where a company like OXEA comes on the list. Or someone like Air Products, who now have a very small true chemicals footprint, yet have more connected suppliers than companies with 10 times their spend.

 

Tags: QuickLink, QuickLink Email, QuickLink ERP, QuickLink Portal, QuickLink Print, Supply Chain Management, customer management, supplier management Read More

Top 10 Themes

1.       Simplification – shorten lead time

a.     A. Schulman – Customer Order Frequency (Small orders, more frequent, shorter lead times) and of 6 Tenants “Urgency”

b.    Dow – Accuracy – productivity – 24x7 Order Received & Confirmed

2.       Visibility – Use Cases (Delivery/Responsiveness)

a.     A. Schulman – Learn new ways of buying & selling shown by customers

b.    Dow – address Core customers – easy to do business with Dow

3.       Modernization – (Transport/Warehousing)

a.     Vopak - High Level of service – retention of key customers

Tags: Supply Chain Conference, Logistics, customer management, supplier management, Global Supply Management, sourcing management, QuickLink Email Read More

Patently This Cannot Be Correct

 

Anyone who has spent any time with me knows that I went to a British, all male, naval boarding school. My wife claims that the trauma of it explains my love of musical theatre, shoe shopping and pink drinks (current favourite is equal measures of Vanilla Vodka, Orange Juice and Cranberry Juice).

 

We used to do parades where you had 700 boys marching around a big square on a cold February Sunday morning wearing Naval uniforms. There is an apocryphal story of a mother watching the parade and then questioning loudly “why is everybody out of step, except for my son Johnnie”.

 

Tags: procurement, Supply Chain Management, sourcing management Read More

Repeat Order Replenishment Solves Very Common Problem

Elemica’s Repeat Order Replenishment solution solves a very common problem faced by many of our clients. It may be able to help you as well, if you face a similar situation.

The situation is anytime your CSRs need to place more or less the same standing order, or orders, on a fixed or variable schedule. You may have a commitment with your customer to deliver five railcars or four truckloads of the same product every day, or every Tuesday and Friday. The problem is, when a CSR has to type the same repetitive order into SAP every day, for weeks and months, mistakes tend to creep into the process. This can result in the customer receiving too much product, too little product, or even the wrong product.

Tags: customer management, replenishment, Supply Chain Management Read More

Who is more attractive?

So who is more attractive Natalie Portman, or Scarlet Johansson? Or maybe you think that it is Diana Rigg or Sophia Loren? How can you say one is better than another. This is how I feel around supply chains. The nicest part of my job is that I get to hear about lots of different supply chain needs and get to offer opinions on ways to improve them. I cannot say one is better than another, we have some mature supply chains and we have some newer models. We have ones that are changing because of new technology or new product portfolios.

 

Tags: logistics management, Supply Chain Management, Road Transport Read More

European Parliament Adopts New Rules

Last year the European Parliament adopted the text of a new directive supplementing VAT Directive 2006/112/EC.*  The result of this adoption appears to be more choice in how to prove the authenticity and integrity of electronic invoices. 

 

Nothing has changed regarding the high level requirements of electronic invoices – they must still reflect actual supplies and their authenticity, integrity and legibility must be ensured.  (This now applies to paper invoices too, putting electronic and paper invoices on equal footing).

 

The change this amendment brings is that instead of defining and limiting the ways in which authenticity and integrity can be ensured, it is now left open. In the words of the directive itself:

‘ The authenticity and integrity of electronic invoices can also be ensured by using certain existing technologies … However, since other technologies exist, taxable persons should not be required to use any particular electronic-invoicing technology.’

 

Tags: VAT, VAT Directive, eInvoice, electronic invoice, eInvoice authenticity, eInvoice Integrity, tax audit Read More

Brian Selby Speaking at Conference

I'm pleased to be part of the upcoming China Petroleum & Chemical International Conference 2011 organized by the Tianjin Municipal Government, the China Petroleum & Chemical Industry Federation, IHS and AICM from 7 - 9 September. My presentation will focus on China SCM Efficiency & Profitability. Hope to see you at the conference or please drop by the Elemica exhibitor's booth during the conference to pick up some product information. http://www.chemweek.com/CPCIC11/Agenda/7/

 

Tags: China Petroleum & Chemical International Conference, SCM Efficiency & Profitability, China Petroleum & Chemical Industry Federation Read More

Channel Your Inner Colin Firth

 

As an Englishman, one tries to channel your inner Colin Firth when you are working in the USA. For some reason there is a belief that an English accent ups our IQ level by a good 20 points. Which is why when I was in the USA recently I almost lost that inner calm.

 

“The lady said 86%”, was what I was thinking. OMG ….. 86%?

 

The lady in question was a very charming and very intelligent VP of Customer Services for a tyre company. She was saying that 86% of her inbound orders from her customers are automated. The best I hear in the chemical industry is about 60% (from Shell Chemicals). Typically chemical companies are in the range of 30 to 40%. Later, when I was sitting staring at my glass of White Zinfandel, thinking of what she had said, I started making excuses for the Chemical companies. Our supply chain is different, the customers are different, the products are different and so on.

 

Tags: QuickLink Email, QuickLink ERP, automating orders, customer management Read More

Elemica’s Rail Car Fulfillment Solution

What is this solution all about, and how can it help me?

This Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) solution, which has been available from Elemica for a number of years, is meant to solve a very specific fulfillment scenario that many of our clients face.These clients are in a replenishment relationship with specific clients whereby they are obligated, sometimes even contractually, to keep a certain number of rail cars full of product on the customer’s premises at all times.Such a relationship would typically be associated with a just-in-time or Kanban-type manufacturing environment.

Tags: safety stock, consignment inventory, rail car fulfillment, customer management Read More

Evolving Customer Management Solutions

Recently I was thinking back to the early days (we are talking 2001) when our Vendor Managed Inventory solution was first conceived.  Initial thinking was to have it pre-process demand data to feed SAP APO.   Knowing what was involved in making APO work and challenges with demand data I was skeptical that this would really solve any market problems.  Thankfully, we were able to nudge the solution strategy to rationalize various data streams into discrete orders that can be processed by an ERP system.  This allowed suppliers to leverage their existing 'traditional order management' connection to buyers not generating discrete purchase orders or releases.    

Elemica's Customer Management solutions have evolved further and now solve a wide variety of market needs to solve customer variability and complexity:

 

Tags: QuickLink Print, QuickLink Email, vendor managed inventory, customer management Read More

It is Nice to be Ahead of a Trend

 

I don’t claim to be Steve Job, but being able to talk to companies knowing you have something that is ahead of the market is refreshing. What do we have that is so clever? Well, something to manage inbound logistics.

Now that may not sound so clever, but it is something that nobody seems to have focused on. 

 

I have had two conversations over the last few weeks, one was a tyre company and one was in the paper industry. Both of them are saying that tracking inbound raw materials would add value. BIG value. It is the difference between a plant running smoothly and having to get emergency shipments to keep a plant running.

 

Tags: Purchasing Tool Kit, Inbound Logistics, GSM, Global Supply Management, logistics management Read More

10 Years Ago vs. Today

 

10 years ago, connecting a partner to a B2B network involved the following specific tasks:

 

1.       Establish technical connectivity

a.      Exchange connectivity information

b.      Identify security considerations: Certificate(s), Firewall, etc.

2.       Exchange data transformation information

a.      Data standard: EDI, XML, Flat file

b.      Real time, batched

3.       Develop data transformation routines

4.       Develop special processing rules

a.      Unit of Measure conversion

b.      Master data validation

5.       Test

6.       Go-live

 

The whole process would have taken anywhere between 2 weeks to 3 months depending on trading partner capability, project management experience, priority within their company to connect etc.

 

Today, it doesn’t have to be this way…

 

Tags: QuickLink ERP, QuickLink Portal, trading partner on-boarding, Data Integration, Process Integration, B2B Integration Read More

One word can cause a surge of adrenaline for most people, while for some others it sparks excitement: CHANGE. 

Adapting to something new is uncomfortable, and in the work environment, change can be perceived as potentially threatening.  One of the most significant changes this decade is the adoption of social networking.   There are more than 750 million active users of Facebook, and its adoption rate skyrocketed beyond that of the telephone, television, or even the personal computer.  Social networking now accounts for 22% of all time spent online in the US.  Humans are social creatures, so why not capitalize on our social impulses and leverage social media for business?  When you get right down to it, it’s all about connecting.

On a personal level, I fought the whole social networking frenzy for a long time.

Tags: social networking, B2B, connecting Read More

Round Table from Different Industries to Collaboratively Discuss Managing the Tail End Spend

Elemica recently organized a Round Table with six organizations from different industries participating to collaboratively discuss how to manage the tail end of your spend. Using the Pareto principle to define the tail, it includes the 20% of your spend supplied by 80% of your suppliers. This typically excludes the raw materials and CAPEX from the tail spend and includes consumables like MRO and PPE.

Does the effort pay off?

Tags: spend, procurement, sourcing management, tail end, c-parts, indirect materials, MRO Read More

Release of v4.5.2

The latest version of the Elemica QuickLink™ Portal was release on Friday July 8^th. We are happy to report that the release of v4.5.2 went smoothly with minimal interruption.

 

Included in this latest release:

Tags: Portal Upgrade, Product Release, QuickLink Portal Read More

A Product to Change how Companies Connect and Process Commerce

The iPhone can do the 50 meters breaststroke in 29.0 seconds. Bathing suits with pockets are expensive and a bad idea. But to my amazement today, after 10 days in a $2 bag of rice, my iPhone is working as if it never made the plunge. What a bulletproof product. A product which its own company’s internal market research said, “It will fail. There is not a market for a phone combined with an iPod and computer. Palm and RIMM dominate the space.”

My iPhone experience made me think about how wide open the B2B, EDI, supply chain technology, SaaS, Integration in the cloud, VAN, emarket, esourcing, ethis, ethat Industry is… an industry that cannot even decide on a name let alone agree to a standard. The space is just dying for a product like the iPhone to come and change how companies connect and process commerce.

Tags: QuickLink, B2B Integration Read More

It’s a "Good News"/ "Bad News" Situation

 

It’s definitely the good problem to have. You are receiving orders from your customers; the alternative is much worse. The bad news is that you have to manually enter these into your system. Your team may be converting customer units of measure and product identifiers into your system values. The potential for keystroke error exists. Plus this takes time. Your other Elemica orders automatically flow into your ERP system. Why not have your email and fax orders flow in the same way?

 

With Elemica QuickLink™ Email and QuickLink™ Print they can!

 

Questions we hear from prospective customers include: How do I get started? Should I use email versus print? How much customer involvement is needed? Is this an OCR solution?

 

Below are some answers based on our customer experience...

 

Tags: QuickLink Email, QuickLink Print, customer management Read More

Elemica Hosts an Exciting Round Table with Blue Chip Customers

At the beginning of July Elemica held an exciting round table discussion in Amsterdam among some of our blue chip companies to define the best practices regarding the purchase of merchandising products.

Many of the buyers, who have been confronted to source such products at one point, have found it to be a big headache. Purchasing atypical creative products issued from marketing in a time constraint is a real challenge. We uncovered how companies have best met these ambitious goals and remained ahead of the demand!

The main topics of the discussion were set on:

Tags: sourcing management Read More