Democratizing Advanced Analytics: The New Era of Supply Chain Planning

Why has supply chain optimization traditionally been confined to such a small group of specialists? I guess, why are advanced analytics not more accessible?

That's a very good question and also a very interesting one.

I see there's three different reasons and they also are connected to each other.

First, the tools itself.

So the mass behind supply chain optimization exists for decades, but the software around it was built by experts and also for experts.

So this means, yeah, so there are expensive licenses, then also implementation projects that take years or months.

And so this means also network design or also supply chain optimization became a kind of consulting project you're doing every few years and it is not a capability you had in-house.

Second, also the people itself.

Only about one in ten companies say they have enough analytics talent in-house.

And to be honest, according to our experience, also this number hasn't really moved in the last years.

And also a third point, also the consequence.

So everyone also fell back to Excel.

And also a recent study showed that more than 80% of the companies are still running.

So they are planning and optimization processes on spreadsheets.

And to conclude, I think so the mass never was a problem.

the access was and that's exactly also what is currently changing and also where we try to or what we are trying to change to make the access to these kind of tools easier and also more intuitive.