OnTarget

Long Leadtimes

A European branded goods manufacturer had recently moved its production to Malaysia to cut costs. A siloed team structure meant confusion about the new lead-times. OnTarget provided visibility using the What If function in order to simulate the safety stock requirement needs for different lead-times plus align cross-functional expectations.

OnTarget enables

Lead-time scenario planning using OnTarget's ability to clearly baseline and scenario-plan new supply routes in order to calculate the potential stock impact.

Did you know?

Your lead times contribute a significant amount of risk to the Period of Uncertainty which safety stock protects. OnTarget can help to simulate the impact of changing lead times, either through collaboration with suppliers, or by moving your production facilities.

Sku Life Cycle

A global producer of wines came to Sequoia with an inventory management challenge as each year presented a new vintage and therefore a new SKU. OnTarget allowed our client to link each vintage and use the history of all vintages in their safety stock calculation to provide a statistically robust recommendation.

OnTarget enables

The user to link SKUs' history, which supports organisations with high levels of innovation and SKU turnover by maintaining their historical data to support the statistical safety stock calculation.

Did you know?

By defining a SKU as a Variant of another, OnTarget's safety stock algorithm will consider the combined history of the SKUs when calculating variability. Add into that any pack size differences and the net result allows for a larger, more relevant dataset with greater accuracy.

Segmentation

A global medical supplies client had a network of in-country warehouses served from a central global warehouse through a chain of nodes. Some markets had erratic demand patterns due to local government policy driving erratic local demand. Using OnTarget allowed the business to quantify the additional inventory required to serve the Russian market from stock, via a make-to-stock strategy and the associated cost to compete in this high-potential market.

OnTarget enables

Tailored safety stock recommendations according to the manufacturing strategy of each SKU and enables scenario planning as strategies evolve.

Did you know?

Intuitive controls to include/exclude SKUs and segments provides safety stock recommendation scenarios. Questions clients typically ask include: Should this market be MTO? How much safety stock would I need if they aren’t? What additional inventory cost am I incurring by stocking SKUs for this market? As sales change (e.g. as online and direct-to-customer channels grow), you can better understand the impact on safety stock.

ERP System

A well-known beverage company came to us after spending over $60 million on a SAP implementation. They were grappling with how to manage their ERP parameters to release the working capital benefit they intuitively felt was there. Together we implemented the OnTarget tool for them which takes a direct data feed from their ERP system and calculates safety stock targets that are easy to review and understand and can be simply loaded back to their ERP system. Using this focus on robust data to manage their working capital, the company reduced their inventory by 20% while consistently delivering over 99% product availability.

OnTarget enables

Planners to 'see under the bonnet' through it's unique interface design.

Did you know?

Sequoia's stock/service algorithm will provide your team with robust, statistically accurate safety stock recommendations based on your ERP data via an easy-to-use interface that empowers planners to control inventory levels via their ERP system (through an simple data load, which can be automated).

Working Capital

A premium drinks manufacturer came to us with a major drive to reduce the working capital they had tied up in their stock. They were looking for a tool and processes that would deliver results globally, in brand and market companies with varied and challenging restrictions. OnTarget was rolled-out across 8 international locations. Through a comprehensive benefits realisation programme our client was able to reduce inventory holding by 25%, with a $60m capital reduction. Once this initial benefit was understood they were then able to go further and use the What-If functionality to challenge current working practices and unlock further potential.

OnTarget enables

Statistically robust safety stock targets and uses What-if functionality to challenge current working practice and put a cost against the existing way of working.

Did you know?

Having robust, statistically calculated safety stocks can deliver 15-25% reduction in inventory? Through implementing OnTarget companies get an intuitive user interface that ensures planners can gain control of their inventory and place a monetary value on operational decision-making.

Decision Making

A Fortune 50 FMCG company built upon their initial safety stock work with us by developing a global inventory group that all worked on the OnTarget platform consistently and established a cross-functional inventory council. They could then leverage the insights from the tool without requiring extensive SC training, due to the innovative design of the OnTarget interface.

OnTarget enables

Users to feel empowered to articulate supply challenges and opportunities.

Did you know?

Through a simple data upload process, OnTarget can take thousands of lines of your transaction data and distil it into insights and opportunities for your planners that they can easily share with supply chain colleagues, functional counterparts and senior management in a consistent, easy-to-understand format.

Constraints

An international spirits company came to Sequoia with the challenge of improving their inventory management capability, standardising best practice systems and reduce their working capital. Due to complex local legislations the client was missing service targets and incurring fines. Through the use of the constraints feature in OnTarget they could scenario plan for legal compliance and fine minimisation. The result? The ability to identify the safety stock required to support this operating jurisdiction and negotiate with the government over fines.

OnTarget enables

Planners to use the 'constraints' feature to deliver a modified safety stock target and service level consequences, taking account of physical, financial or shelf life limitations for a product.

Did you know?

If your warehouse space and working capital of shelf life is a limitation, OnTarget is the tool to manage these constraints. Define any constraint at the SKU/Warehouse level and OnTarget will calculate the consequences, allowing you to make a stock/service/risk trade-off decision. OnTarget will also highlight if any constraint has been surpassed for a specific SKU.

EOQ / EBQ

A well-known flavouring manufacturer worked with us initially to develop their safety stock targets. They quickly realised that the bank of data they had created and cleansed provided them with the platform to calculate what their EOQ from suppliers should be, what their EBQ should be, and to articulate the cost of poor forecasting on their inventory holding and warehousing costs.

OnTarget enables

Visualisation of the simple $ value of stock/service, economic order quantity and cost-to-serve decisions.

Did you know?

OnTarget contains a user interface designed in collaboration with one of the largest FMCG companies in the world. It provides the functionality - leveraging underlying data and algorithms to visually demonstrate 'what-if' scenarios. I.e; what-if we increase our service/availability target - how much more safety stock would that require. What-if we wanted to avoid obsolescence risk - what impact would that have on our ability to serve?

Supply issues

Having correctly calculated the safety stock requirement for their current ways of working, showing a 15% improvement in working capital, OnTarget's What-If functionality was used to ask "What If our supply error could be improved?", "What if we could reduce our lead-times?" and "What if we could improve our forecasting?". While all these revealed working capital reduction opportunities, it was the further 10% improvement shown from optimising production's conformance-to-plan that piqued their interest.

OnTarget enables

Assessment of supply variability and uses Sequoia's stock algorithm to calculate the appropriate amount of safety stock.

Did you know?

Poor conformance to plan - be it from production problems or 3rd party supplier issues - can create havoc in the supply chain. While the reasons for the supply error need to be addressed, having the safety stock in place to cover the error will free up resources and time.