Highlights
Industry: High-tech (Global Networking Equipment Manufacturer)
Geography (Global): HQ in North America, CM/ODM/Component Manufacturers in Asia Pacific, EU and Mexico
Scope: Strategic Supplier Performance Reviews, Cost Management Collaboration, NPI Engineering, Component Engineering, Returns
Cross-functional Teams: Engineering, Sourcing, Supply Chain Operations
Strategic Supply Chain Partners: Contract Manufacturing Partners, Key Component Manufacturers (PCB, ASIC..)
Systems Connected: Coupa, SAP, Oracle, Agile PLM
Total number of stakeholders involved: 300+ globally
Key Strategic Supply Chain Collaboration Issues
- Cross-functional teams and strategic supplier teams primarily relied on email to collaborate on several critical processes related to NPI Engineering, NPI Sourcing, Test Engineering, Component Engineering, Supplier Quality, and Cost Management
- Strategic supplier performance evaluation and development was complicated because of the number of people across functions involved in the process
- Systematic supplier communication (for engineering, compliance, sustainability, cost management..) with hundreds of suppliers was difficult
Strategic Supply Chain Partner Portal
The organization adopted ZFlow to work closely with key CM partners. Several critical workflows related to NPI Engineering, Test Engineering, Cost Management, Component Engineering, and Supplier Performance Evaluation were designed so that internal cross-functional teams from the organization and strategic supply chain partners could coordinate systematically via workflow-driven collaboration to share/use information and complete many of the activities transparently.
Below are a few examples of cross-functional workflows that are set up for collaboration and coordination between strategic supply chain partners and internal cross-functional teams. The examples include processes initiated by suppliers as well as initiated by internal teams that also include suppliers as key activity performers.
Example – Batch Manufacturing Record (initiated by Supply Chain Partner)
Example – Supplier Corrective Action Report (started internally, but assigned to supplier team members as key workflow actors.)
