Supply chain executives from various industries had been surveyed in order to get a clear view of business objectives, technologies and current practices and performances in regards to the industrie's supply chain systems, supply chain management and logistics efforts.
The study has gathered the data for China plus compared it to similar studies made in other parts of the world, including North America, Europe, India and Japan.
Using their own benchmarking system, IBM has laid out how effective and developed the supply chain management in China is performing and how it is coming up in comparison to most advanced supply chain pracices around the world. This includes not only supply chain management and logistics, but product development, sourcing, supply chain planning and procurement as well.
The IBM study implements that understanding of demand patterns aw well as optimized supply chain planning are essentials of successful and effective supply chain management. It was suggested that within a rapidly developing country like China the ability to launch new products to the market quickly and have them distributed properly may be a major key to success.
Forecasting, use of new software and technology, information sharing with suppliers and retailers, a strikt weekly planning process as well as software based, automatically generated supply and demand plans need to be adjusted or implemented into core business.
Especially when it comes to the food industry, on-time fast delivery is really important, especially when it comes to supplying and distributing critical food products with short or medium shelf life or that may have to be kept within the cooling chain.
