Six Companies Competing for 2011 Supply Chain Innovation Award

Teams that demonstrated how their supply chain practices reduced costs, streamlined processes, saved energy, and improved operating efficiencies are finalists in the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals' (CSCMP) seventh annual Supply Chain Innovation Award competition.

The teams will present their case studies in the Supply Chain Innovations of the Year educational track at CSCMP's Annual Conference 2011, October 2-5, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Each team will discuss the creative and nontraditional approaches, operations and cost-saving initiatives that resulted in their unique supply chain achievements. Finalist teams and their innovations include:

• ADT Security Services, Inc. and Inmar, Inc. collaborated in the development of a centralized return model, which delivered improvements in efficiency and return on investment. The results produced improvements in cycle time, and a reduction in administrative time and shipping costs.
• Ahold USA, Del Monte, and ES3, LLC implemented a direct-to-store (D2S) program that provides a shared, collaborative warehouse for manufacturers and retailers. Implementation results indicated a reduction in costs and carbon usage, improved speed to shelf, and increased on-shelf visibility.
• Dow Chemical Co. collaborated with Dr. Timothy Pettit of the Air Force Institute of Technology to research and develop a new way to assess business resilience. This collaboration resulted in a methodology to test supply chain capabilities against vulnerabilities, and was successfully applied to Dow's glycol ethers P-series business, resulting in significant benefits.
• IBM developed and deployed the Total Risk Assessment Tool to assess supply and supply chain risk. The Tool considers a wide range of external factors and returns a risk rating for each major grouping.
• Motorola Mobility innovatively used supplier sales and operations planning (S&OP) to better meet customer demand and improve supplier/customer relationships. This created more revenue opportunities, improved gross margin, and reduced excess and obsolescence (E&O) exposure.
• Polo Ralph Lauren's deployment of an international vendor routing portal to extend inbound control resulted in a reduction of costs by alignment of air services, as well as an extension of handover visibility and reduced cycle times.