Supply Chain Strategy

Assessed current distribution network and designed a “greenfield” distribution strategy for US operations of multi-billion dollar durable goods distributor.
The study identified cost savings opportunities of $40+ million annually through improved alignment of customers to DCs, modal shifts, and improved stocking strategies while validating the location of the existing facilities. The study assisted the client in establishing delivery service levels based on competitor’s capabilities instead of one based upon current performance.

The multi-billion dollar US Division of an Asia-based manufacturer and distributor of high-tech products selected Chainalytics to design a new US distribution network.
Our client needed to redesign its distribution network following the acquisition of two of its largest competitors. The company needed to rationalize the network operations for the newly merged companies. By combining the disparate networks, the company streamlined the configuration and distribution operations, reduced inventory of both finished goods and component parts and realigned customer service territory assignments with the new distribution facility network.

Developed an optimal supply chain strategy for a multi-billion dollar manufacturer of temperature-controlled food products.
Our client needed to realign its production and distribution to keep pace both with market growth and competitive market pressures. The strategy included manufacturing rationalization, optimal placement of production lines, and expansion of distribution capacity to support market growth. The resulting strategy identified significant annual operating cost reduction while improving customer cycle times.

Rationalized manufacturing and distribution strategies for a billion dollar consumer manufacturing business.
Our client needed to develop a new strategy to keep pace with competitive market pressures and rising production costs. The new strategy included the optimal placement of production lines to reduce inter-facility transportation costs, evaluation of in-sourced vs. outsourced overseas manufacturing and the assessment of possible plant closures. The resulting strategy identified cost reductions of up to $20 million annually.

Providing ongoing analytical support of supply chain strategic planning processes at a multi-billion consumer and office products manufacturer.
This support includes model design, activity-based costing, and scenario analysis their North American supply chain. The scope of the modeling effort includes line-level manufacturing decisions, distribution, and seasonal build strategies for inventory and production (multi-period optimization).

Conducted supply chain network analysis and optimization for a multi-billion dollar division of one of North America’s largest food industry conglomerates.
Following significant growth and acquisition activities our client was faced with several decisions including, capacity planning, customer/DC alignment, distribution planning and facility operating decisions. Chainalytics helped to rationalize production capacity and realign distribution of 1,500 SKUs across the network of 16 manufacturing and distribution facilities.

Developed an optimal distribution network for a multi-billion foodservice distributor.
The strategy included DC rationalization and consideration of optimal locations to support existing and new customers/stores while ensuring customer service levels were met and inventory levels were optimized within the network.

Optimized the global distribution network for a multi-billion dollar chemical manufacturer.
When the multi-billion dollar division was spun off from its parent, Chainalytics was engaged to design a new distribution network that could operate autonomously from the former parent company. The strategy included global DC rationalization of over 100 existing facilities, optimal placement of product, and expansion of distribution capacity to support market growth. The resulting strategy identified significant annual operating cost reduction from the rationalization of the global DC network.

Supported distribution network design for a multi-billion foodservice marketer and distributor.
Our client owns a network design application that they have used over the past few years to help design their regional DC network. Since the last study they performed the main application users had moved into other roles. To update the network design models, taking into account the latest business realties, our client hired Chainalytics to perform the analysis and mentor their internal resources so that they could build an internal competency to perform these types of analyses in-house in the future.

Analyzed manufacturing rationalization for the prepared foods division of one of North America’s largest food conglomerates.
Our client wanted to consolidate production for some products at one of its two US facilities (rather than making the full line of products at both facilities). Chainalytics helped the company to assess the total cost and service impacts of shifting production. The analysis showed that the additional distribution costs incurred outweighed the savings that could be realized by rationalizing production. As a result of the study, the company decided to service some of its customers through distribution centers that had previously been served direct from production facilities.

Redesigned North American distribution network for a global confectionary manufacturer.
Our client asked Chainalytics to help them determine the best-fit distribution network for North America given that a new manufacturing plant was being constructed. All existing distribution centers were candidates for expansion or closing, and Greenfield sites were available as well. Considering the highly seasonal nature of our client’s business, Chainalytics built a multi-time period model that showed a potential $5M in savings from moving or closing existing facilities and expanding others.

Designed a Pan-India retail distribution network for one of India’s largest conglomerates.
Our client was launching a greenfield retail venture and needed help in defining the optimal greenfield distribution network. Chainalytics performed an analysis which showed the optimal DC locations to support the planned 3,000 store roll-out over the next few years, including a wide range of sensitivities to demonstrate the impact of uncertainty on the distribution network design.

Optimized the distribution strategy for a North American big-box retailer.
Our client was planning to increase the number of stores by 10% over the next several years. At the same time it planned to add significantly to its product offering entering into new regional markets. The existing regional DC-to-store alignment had been created prior to the expansion and was not going to be adequate, going forward. The analysis included capacity expansion scenarios to determine where to add new DCs to support high-growth regional markets.

Rationalized the logistics network for a multi-million dollar regional utility.
Our client required a network study to identify opportunities in merging the supply chains of its three main divisions. The transportation savings that could be reduced with full stocking centers had to be balanced against distributing the inventory to more locations.

Optimized the service center network for a national rental retailer.
After years of growth through acquisition our client needed help to design a network of service centers to better support current demand and planned growth over the next five years. Chainalytics built a strategic model taking into account the fleet service constraints, inventory implications, and costing of current and candidate locations to help our client reduce cost and improve service. The resulting model identified savings of almost $3M annually.

Optimized the service center network for a multi-million dollar regional utility.
Our client served more than two million customers in a relatively small geographic area. With their infrastructure of operating centers set up more than forty years ago, it was time to investigate how the current locations could be moved, closed, or resized to match current and future demand. A strategic model was developed that minimized cost of the technicians that performed emergency and scheduled services on the utility network while maintaining their service requirements. The resulting model identified $2.3M in annual savings from re-aligning the operating centers.

Developed an optimal supply chain network for a multi-billion division of a global beverage manufacturer.
Strategy included modeling various supply chain network alternatives and to analyze which option or combination of options was ideal to support their goal of significant revenue growth. Acquisition was also pending that was included in the scenario analysis to determine optimal network design.

Demand

Implemented a cost-to-serve analytics capability for a multi-billion dollar consumer goods manufacturer.
Chainalytics worked with our client to implement cost-to-serve tools and processes to support customer supply chain manager interactions with retail customers.  Our client needed to identify and quantify the opportunities to reduce supply chain complexity across its product and customer portfolios to reduce cost and/or enhance margins.  The new process allowed for timely, rigorous analysis of customer compliance which led to approximately $4 Million in savings.

Assessed the demand-supply planning practices for a multi-billion dollar publisher.
Chainalytics assessed the supply chain practices of our client in order to improve its annual budgeting process and to synchronize forecasting, inventory optimization and procurement decisions. Our client needed to align long production-delivery lead-times with sales forecasts so as to fulfill orders with minimal amount of build-ahead inventory. Through a pilot with a large division, Chainalytics demonstrated how our client could improve its forecast accuracy by using decision support technology to reconcile its top-down and bottom-up sales forecasts, and, furthermore, developed business rules – supported by quantitative analysis – to enhance procurement decisions by the buyers.

Transportation

Managed the Transportation Management System (TMS) selection process for the North American operations of a global consumer durables manufacturer.
Our client sought a TMS with first-class optimization capabilities which would support dynamic cross-dock planning. Ease of implementation was also a key requirement. Chainalytics’ selection methodology balanced the initial IT tendency to select a licensed solution against all of the above considerations and an appropriate TMS was selected and deployed. Better routing and cross-dock planning helped to reduce LTL spend and automating manual tasks also contributed to significant savings.

Optimized U.S. transportation operations of a global beverage manufacturer to balance the use of common carriers with its dedicated fleet.
Chainalytics analyzed our client’s current operations to determine the appropriate fleet size at each of its manufacturing facilities as well as whether a lane should be operated by its dedicated fleet or a common carrier. Additionally, Chainalytics analyzed the sensitivity of the recommended fleet size for a number of factors — including carrier rates, fuel prices, and payload impact. The recommended operational strategy garners annual savings up to $4.5 Million

Rationalized the logistics network for a multi-million dollar regional utility.
Our client required a network study to identify opportunities in merging the supply chains of its three main divisions. The transportation savings that could be reduced with full stocking centers had to be balanced against distributing the inventory to more locations.

Conducted root-cause analysis of a durable goods product distributor’s out-of-region shipping activities.
Classified reasons for out-of–region into ten causal drivers. Controllable inventory categories of out-of-stock and not-stocked contributed to 52% of out-of-region shipping. Analysis identified opportunity to reduce annual transportation costs by $3 to $4 million in freight costs. Established methodology and tools to enable the customer to conduct future analyses on an on-going basis.

Analyzed consolidation of transportation planning across multiple divisions of one of the world’s largest food manufacturing conglomerates.
Chainalytics helped create a corporate transportation planning strategy, bringing several autonomous business units into one optimization process. The analysis included 6 separate private and dedicated fleet operations and over half a billion dollars in transportation spend. Initial engagement analyzed each business unit, separately to establish and validate a baseline model. The analysis then focused on leveraging the fleet operations and common carrier contracts across divisions to identify opportunities for regional and planning and collaboration to reduce transportation spend and improve asset utilization while maintaining customer services levels. The businesses now collectively leverage buying power and transportation assets to better service customers’ requirements while reducing network-wide transportation costs. The client realized a first-year annual savings of over 5% of total transportation costs.

Optimized the transportation planning for one of the world’s largest consumer electronics manufacturer.
Deployed a transportation modeling process for analysis purposes as well as an optimization configuration tool. Trained staff in the transportation department on the use of the application, and enabled them to do their own in-house transportation network analyses. In the process, implemented carrier vehicle constraint planning, where the individual vehicle availability of each distribution center was incorporated into transportation planning. Concluded that there were equipment short falls based on current flows and could not accommodate future growth. The client went on to assess various network changes, and how to configure their own transportation optimization/execution application to manage future network changes.

Modeled, optimized and analyzed North American transportation operations for a global multi-billion dollar medical products manufacturer.
Chainalytics assisted our client in implementation of an internal process for transportation modeling and analysis. The software and process needed to include fleet sizing and deployment analysis capabilities as well as the ability to model common carrier services, consolidation strategies and other complex routing decisions. Together with our client, Chainalytics developed internal processes and trained users to support ongoing an analytical competency.

Developed North American logistics operating strategy for a multi-billion dollar manufacturer of automobile and truck parts.
Assessed the deployment of the private fleet and the $125M common carrier spend. The objective was to reduce overall cost without deteriorating service to its OEM customers. The analysis revealed that the fleet could be reduced and redeployed while the logistics organization needed be increased. In subsequent phases of the project, the client will conduct a procurement optimization exercise and research the market for a new Transportation Management System (TMS). Identified over $20 million in first year savings.

Rationalized transportation operations and assets for a multi-billion dollar manufacturer of consumer durables.
Chainalytics modeled and optimized the transportation operations of our client following a large acquisition of a manufacturer of complimentary products. The team modeled the operations of the newly merged network, including the private and dedicated fleet assets and existing common carrier contracts. After analyzing multiple “what-if” scenarios, testing the viability of several alternatives for fleet sizing and deployment, the team arrived at the optimal solution for leveraging the combined fleet assets of the new company. The scenarios included redeploying fleet assets to new domiciles, new consolidation strategies, alternative service levels, changing cross-docking rules, continuous move routings and more.

Assessed the Transportation Management System (TMS) of a North American office equipment manufacturer.
Our client suspected that there were transportation savings in their distribution network that their Transportation Management System (TMS) was not delivering. Chainalytics was engaged to determine if our client’s TMS implementation could be improved to build lower cost transportation plans and to quantify the expected additional value. Chainalytics was able to quickly identify a few key areas where interfaces into the TMS from external systems were failing and causing inaccuracies in the data. Working with our client to improve the quality of the data as a first step, and subsequently new optimization models were created and additional 3%-6% transportation savings were identified.

Designed and implemented new load optimization strategies for a 3PL (Third Party Logistics provider) on behalf of their customer, a manufacturer and distributor of consumer electronics.
Chainalytics developed logistics optimization strategies for the distribution of consumer telecommunications devices which resulted in better load consolidations, streamlined operations, reduced freight costs and inventory levels while simultaneously improving service levels by avoiding inventory stock-outs.

Analyzed transportation costs and ran a collaborative bidding engagement for internal logistics business unit of a multi-billion global distributor of durable goods products.
On behalf of the logistics arm of the high-tech distribution company, Chainalytics conducted analyses of transportation costs which resulted in the design and execution of a collaborative bidding process for LTL, Parcel and Heavyweight Air modes. The result of the process was a savings of 10.5% in the first year of the new contracts.

Optimized LTL procurement for a multi-billion dollar industrial products manufacturer with over $40M in LTL spend spread across over 200 US locations.
Faced with the challenge of leveraging the buying power across 5 disparate business units, Chainalytics was able to pull together all LTL freight requirements and issue a single bid package that met the needs for each business unit. The process allowed both regional and national carriers to compete for the business they were most interested in. The carrier base was significantly reduced to a manageable subset of core carriers while achieving double-digit saving on overall LTL freight contract spending.

Optimized LTL procurement for the logistics unit of a billion dollar construction equipment manufacturer.
Collected lane data and analyzed the current state network requirements and identified savings opportunities for consolidating LTL freight contracts with a core group of US regional and national carriers.

Analyzed transportation spend and optimized TL procurement for one of North America’s largest retailers.
Chainalytics helped to manage a bidding event to select best mix of national and regional carriers. The objectives of optimization included reducing total costs across the network, improving service levels and ensuring quality carrier coverage on less desirable lanes. The results 1) netted a significant savings in carrier contracts, 2) improved service levels for their inbound store deliveries and 3) secured additional capacity commitments from quality carrier partners, across the entire network.

Optimized TL and Intermodal spend for one of the world’s largest forest products companies.
The objective was to reduce freight spend on full-load transportation by finding the best mix of carriers, modes, lanes and services. Through multiple rounds of bidding on both modes where loads can be traded-off from one mode to another, arrived at a final double-digit savings of over 15% on freight spend in-play.

Conducted an optimized transportation procurement event for one of the world’s largest food conglomerates.
Chainalytics worked with our client to execute a comprehensive transportation sourcing strategy for dry van freight in North America. The objective was to determine the proper utilization of common carrier service, dedicated fleet assets, and existing private fleet assets. Achieving the optimal mix entailed analyzing the common carrier bids, the dedicated fleet bids, and private fleet costing together in one model instead of separately as is commonly done. This allowed our client to see what areas of the network in which to use the private and dedicated fleets given the new rates that had been collected from common carriers. This not only drove additional savings for the network, but also additional efficiency and utilization of private fleet assets.

Distribution & Inventory

Rationalized the logistics network for a multi-million dollar regional utility.
Our client required a network study to identify opportunities in merging the supply chains of its three main divisions. The transportation savings that could be reduced with full stocking centers had to be balanced against distributing the inventory to more locations.

Optimized the inventory deployment strategy for a multi-billion dollar durable goods distributor.
Chainalytics helped identify an optimal inventory deployment strategy that resulted in annual savings of several million dollars, without a reduction in the order fill rates. Furthermore, Chainalytics helped the customer establish a methodology and a set of tools to enable future inventory deployment analyses on an on-going basis.

Optimized inventory strategy for a multi-billion dollar manufacturer of medical products.
Chainalytics helped our client determine the optimal number of stocking locations, an inventory deployment strategy and the target inventory levels for a high-volume product line. The analysis included the development of a “total cost to serve” model that balanced transportation and inventory costs, specification of the locations to hold inventory, and the optimal inventory level for each product at each location to maintain service level targets at minimum total cost. Subsequent implementation of the study results generated savings in excess of $2M for a single product line. Furthermore, Chainalytics helped the customer develop an internal capability to analyze and manage inventory deployment on an on-going basis.

Analyzed the inventory strategies for a multi-billion dollar regional grocery retailer.
Developed the optimal inventory targets and replenishment parameters of over 250,000 SKUs servicing hundreds of stores. Included determining optimal positioning of inventory across 5 DCs including multi-echelon alternatives. Simultaneously re-evaluated service territories, modes of transport, and store replenishment frequency. Results identified over $25 million inventory reduction opportunities.

Conducted root-cause analysis of a durable goods product distributor’s out-of-region shipping activities.
Classified reasons for out-of–region into ten causal drivers. Controllable inventory categories of out-of-stock and not-stocked contributed to 52% of out-of-region shipping. Analysis identified opportunity to reduce annual transportation costs by $3 to $4 million in freight costs. Established methodology and tools to enable the customer to conduct future analyses on an on-going basis.

Assessed inventory planning practices for a multi-billion dollar paper manufacturer.
Chainalytics assessed the readiness of our client to participate in CPFR practices with several of its channel partners. The scope included the assessment of a collaborative planning initiative that involved organizational restructuring, process design and capital investments in software. Through quantitative and qualitative analysis, Chainalytics delivered a plan for a phased approach in order to achieve best-in-class performance within 18 months. As the first step, the company was able to expand its collaborative practices to several of its major channel partners and perform direct delivery of full truck loads to its most service-sensitive channel.

Assessed the demand-supply planning practices for a multi-billion dollar publisher.
Chainalytics assessed the supply chain practices of our client in order to improve its annual budgeting process and to synchronize forecasting, inventory optimization and procurement decisions. Our client needed to align long production-delivery lead-times with sales forecasts so as to fulfill orders with minimal amount of build-ahead inventory. Through a pilot with a large division, Chainalytics demonstrated how our client could improve its forecast accuracy by using decision support technology to reconcile its top-down and bottom-up sales forecasts, and, furthermore, developed business rules – supported by quantitative analysis – to enhance procurement decisions by the buyers.

Supply & Manufacturing

Rationalized manufacturing and distribution strategies for a billion dollar consumer manufacturing business.
Our client needed to develop a new strategy to keep pace with competitive market pressures and rising production costs. The new strategy included the optimal placement of production lines to reduce inter-facility transportation costs, evaluation of in-sourced vs. outsourced overseas manufacturing and the assessment of possible plant closures. The resulting strategy identified cost reductions of up to $20 million annually.

Analyzed manufacturing rationalization for the prepared foods division of one of North America’s largest food conglomerates.
Our client wanted to consolidate production for some products at one of its two US facilities (rather than making the full line of products at both facilities). Chainalytics helped the company to assess the total cost and service impacts of shifting production. The analysis showed that the additional distribution costs incurred outweighed the savings that could be realized by rationalizing production. As a result of the study, the company decided to service some of its customers through distribution centers that had previously been served direct from production facilities.