Supply chain management: What’s next for food and beverage — part two

In part one of this post we discussed the smartest ways to gain global visibility and respond to volatility in a food and beverage supply chain. And here in part two we will cover how to embrace the best technology. Addressing these key challenges can have a profound and positive impact on your entire supply chain—from procurement to manufacturing to delivery.

Embrace the best technology

When you're looking at building a better foundation to address the challenges you may be facing within your overall organization, there's a number of solutions to consider. These aren't necessarily always the options that fall into what you’d expect to be a supply chain solution, but they all overlap within your overall supply chain and will help drive effectiveness and efficiency.

The first example is formula management. Many companies want to ascertain that it’s creating the right products for the right country as there may be limitations from a global perspective of where you can sell a product. Trying to manage this manually is challenging. Being able to respond to inquiries from customers and prospects around the globe requires quite a robust formula management solution.

Another example that people are buzzing about nowadays is blockchain. Many of the goals companies believe that blockchain will accomplish can be solved faster, less expensively, and better without invoking blockchain. Now, I'm not saying that blockchain is bad or it does not have potential. What I'm saying is many of the problems regarding traceability and quality that blockchain is trying to address can likely be resolved faster and with greater confidence using existing, proven solutions. The functionality, embedded in modern ERP solutions coupled with a network-based cloud platform, may not have the current intriguing allure of blockchain, but it has unquestionable proven success, is hardened through years of vigorous usage, and is accessible right now across a myriad of partners, suppliers, logistics providers, and carriers.