Global supply networks - a permanent challenge

How can you identify bottlenecks or overcapacities in production before they occur?

The impact of global sourcing on OEMs is enormous. Over and undersupply have similarly dire consequences. Short supply routes and global supply chains exist side by side, and it is necessary to weigh up what is preferable in terms of efficient supply chain management when sourcing parts. Long supply chains always mean risks: bottlenecks or cost-intensive emergency actions sometimes have to be dealt with in order to ensure supply security. flexis helps to minimize these risks:

  • In the event of bottlenecks, our solutions identify affected orders and create alternative demand scenarios so that the available capacities can be used optimally.
  • flexis solutions recognize parts and resource capacities that become free or are no longer needed. These can then be used elsewhere or reduced.
  • Our solutions enable integrated planning processes between sales, production, production planning, logistics, scheduling, and purchasing, such that requirements and capacities can be optimally matched.

Do you have an overview of the supply security of your scheduled orders?

A special challenge arises from the convergence of a large number of variants and supplier plants distributed worldwide. Since it is almost impossible to keep all parts in sufficient quantities available in the factory warehouse, OEMs call them up on an order-oriented basis - even for globally procured parts. Under these circumstances, what is the best way to deal with fluctuations in demand due to market changes? Inventories cause high storage costs. Short-term reactions in production or emergency actions by logistics drive up flexibility costs. It is crucial to see which orders can be built with the available parts in time. This includes parts that are already in the inflow.

In order to distribute stocks and flexibility efficiently within the value-added network, transparency across order planning and materials scheduling (two previously organizationally separate areas) is essential. Supply chain management is a holistic strategic task that can only be mastered through the interaction of all participants.

Unpredictable capacity bottlenecks: can the effects be analyzed?

flexis solutions make a decisive contribution to mastering these challenges. Program planning is constantly compared with production capacities, options, and parts availability to ensure buildability. Alternatives can be tested in what-if scenarios. This brings a number of crucial advantages:

  • Stabilization of the production program and reliable scheduling
  • Increased adherence to delivery dates thanks to the alignment of customer delivery dates and capacities
  • Reduction of short-term measures for troubleshooting through early detection of changes in demand and capacity
  • Transparency of multilevel part availability and capacity utilization
  • Securing medium- and long-term delivery call-offs