SUPPLY CHAIN STANDARD SEPTEMBER 2008
www.supplychainstandard.com
VIEWPOINT
Many manufacturers are also
looking to pursue collaborative
strategies for parts of their
supply chain - hitherto
unthinkable in this industry.
Japan, Europe
and Turkey. “The
main challenge in
supply chain is to manage
these extended supply and
demand chains effectively.”
It’s also important, in a tightening world
market says Craig, to grasp customer
demand and adjust manufacturing plans.
“We also have to have up to date
information about the level of finished vehicle stock
in the distribution chain, from which we can adjust our
manufacturing plan” – so the manufacturing operation itself,
including parts and components supply, needs to be flexible
so that it can respond quickly to changes.
Flexible manufacturing linked to customer demand and
with feedback of actual logistics conditions is key,” Craig
adds. There is also need to support increased customer
PAUL DYER
DHL
SCS:AUTOMOTIVE LOGISTICS 21
The migration of
manufacturing to Eastern
Europe has now been
overtaken by
developments in places like
India or China.
options, or ‘mass-customisation’, where customers can
specify an individual combination of options, rather than
only having certain ‘standard’ choices.
Stefan Bernhardt, head of IT at commercial vehicle
makers MAN, sees not only manufacturing but
development work moving to developing markets such
as Russia or in Asia. “It's not enough to just produce
locally” – it is as much a matter of understanding the
local culture as churning out vehicles, he says.
Another member of the Roland Berger team, Dr
Martin Wittig, says that new generation product
lifecycle management (PLM) systems have also
made possible a much more dispersed
manufacturing operation. PLM systems has been
around a good ten years and while the earlier
versions weren't particularly user friendly, the best
of them such as Dassault Systems’ latest version of
Enovia allow designers on opposite sides of the
world to play with 3D pictures of component designs
in real time. As Dassault CEO Bernald Charles
remarked at the conference launching Enovia's PLM 2.0,
adults are finally getting to play with the same sort of
technology in the office that their offspring have been using
in their Wii games for some time now. And as Walter
Knoblach of German auto parts maker Schuler told the same
conference, “we can now share work in progress in 3D, with
one server working the whole system”.
Sophistication
Such design sophistication can only accelerate the diffusion
of the car industry. Crucially, it could also allow slow and
ponderous OEMs and their suppliers to speed up innovation
in responsive to quixotic customer demand like the apparel
or consumer electronics industries.
Joining up may not always be easy to do, but it is an area
that car makers must address if they are to further improve
the efficiency of their logistics chains. Increasingly, though,
there are logistics service providers that can provide a
complete service, dealing with all aspects of the automotive
supply chain such as inbound logistics, in-plant logistics, the
after market and even delivery of finished vehicles.
Paul Dyer, managing director of DHL’s automotive
business, says that many manufacturers are also looking to
pursue collaborative strategies for parts of their supply chain
– hitherto unthinkable in this industry.
One factor that has this is global sourcing of components –
the longer the distance, the more sense collaboration can
STEVE RUSSELL
NYK LOGISTICS
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