An e-supply chain is the flow of materials, information, money, and services from raw material suppliers through factories and warehouses to the end customers. A supply chain also includes the organizations and processes that create and deliver products, information, and services to the end customers. The term supply chain comes from the concept of linking together different partnering organizations. Simply put, a supply chain involves activities that take place during the entire product life cycle. In reality, a supply chain is more than that, as it also includes the movement of information and money and the procedures that support the movement of a product or a service.
[...] Collaborative commerce among members of the supply chain can be done in many areas ranging from product design to demand forecasting. The results are shorter cycle times, minimal delays and work interruptions, lower inventories, and less administrative cost. In fact, all these processes are developed by e-supply chain and e-networks technology. As an example, we take just a small part of the process at General Motors (GM).Designing a car is a complex and lengthy process. Each model created needs to go through a frontal crash test. [...]
[...] E-procurement can improve the operation of the supply chain in various ways: online catalogs can be used to eliminate redesigning of components in product development; visibility of available parts and their attributes enables quick decision making; online purchase orders expedite the ordering process; and advanced-shipping notifications and acknowledgments streamline delivery. Collaborative planning requires buyers and sellers to develop a single shared forecast of demand, and a plan of supply to support this demand, and update it regularly, based on information shared over the internet. [...]
[...] Finally, it now takes less than 18months to bring a new car to market, compared to 4 or more years before, and the design cost is now much lower. For example, during the design phases cars are now “crashed” electronically, and only 10 prototype cars are crashed physically. The change has produced enormous savings. In addition, the shorter time cycle time enables GM to bring out more new car models more quickly, providing the company with a competitive edge. These changes have translated into profit. Despite the economic slowdown, GM's revenues increased more than 6 percent in 2002 and its earnings in the second quarter [...]
[...] A major requirement for any medium to large scale company that is moving to EC (Electronic Commerce) is the integration between the Web and the ERP solutions, in the other words, creating an e-supply chain and managing it E-Supply chains and their Management It is challenging to build a relationship between supply chains and the Web. Though new business models and innovative software offering collaborative commerce and online visibility tend to generate excitement, the issue for many companies comes down to the challenge of integrating the solutions into their infrastructure. [...]
[...] B2B exchanges could play a critical role in e-supply chain management, and the supply web. Supply webs emerge as alternative configurations to the traditional supply chains. Information, transactions, products, and funds all flow to and from multiple nodes in a supply chain. Supply webs that are formed as vertical exchanges and serve industry sectors by integrating the supply chain systems of various buyers and sellers, create virtual trading communities. Some world-class companies, such as wall-mart, Dell Computer, and FedEx, created very sophisticated information systems, exploiting the latest technological developments and creating innovative solutions EC solutions along the supply chain EC as a technology provides solutions along the supply chain. [...]
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