Tag: Maersk

Guest Post: Using Data Analytics to Optimize Operations Management

Charlie Render is CEO of Render Analytics, a Florida-based data analytics consulting firm. He can be reached at https://www.renderanalytics.net/

Harnessing the power of data has emerged as a critical OM strategy for gaining competitive edge. Data-related technologies are being employed to elevate supply chain logistics, manufacturing efficiency, and overall operations.

Data analytics, the topic of Module G in your text, involves the systematic exploration of datasets to glean meaningful decision making insights. In the OM/SCM context, it encompasses the analysis of such diverse data points as order volumes, lead times, transportation costs, inventory levels, and customer behavior trends. This fusion is a natural convergence, given the voluminous data generated at each juncture of the supply chain. 

Here are four real-world examples:

 Amazon’s Demand Forecasting   By meticulously analyzing historical sales data, seasonal patterns, macroeconomic indicators, and even external factors like weather events and cultural trends, Amazon employs advanced predictive models. This enables the firm to anticipate product demand with remarkable accuracy. As a result, it can adjust inventory levels dynamically, minimize excess stock, and ensure the timely availability of popular products. The outcome is not just optimized inventory costs but also a seamless customer shopping experience.

UPS’s Route Optimization  UPS harnesses data analytics to refine its delivery routes. By integrating real-time traffic data, intricate delivery schedules, fuel costs, and even road closures, it constructs a comprehensive algorithmic approach. This approach identifies the shortest, most fuel-efficient routes for its fleets. The outcome is not just a reduction in fuel consumption and operational expenses, but also better on-time deliveries, positively impacting customer satisfaction.

Toyota’s Proactive Quality Assurance Toyota exemplifies how data analytics can revolutionize quality control within assembly lines. By tapping into data generated by sensors embedded within production equipment, Toyota has pioneered real-time quality assurance. This enables the detection of deviations from predefined quality benchmarks throughout the manufacturing process. Swift identification of potential defects lets Toyota rectify issues promptly. This means a reduction in defective units, lower warranty claims, and enhanced customer satisfaction.

Maersk Line – Transforming Container Shipping  Maersk  demonstrates the impactful combination of data analytics and sustainable supply chain practices. With the aim to minimize emissions and optimize routes, Maersk uses data analytics to study factors such as weather patterns, sea currents, and fuel efficiency. By leveraging these insights, it optimizes vessel routes, reducing fuel consumption, and subsequently decreasing greenhouse gas emissions. This data-driven approach not only aligns with a commitment to sustainable shipping, but also helps achieve substantial cost savings.

OM Podcast #2: How Does Blockchain Work?

Welcome to our second Operations management podcast! Today, Jay Heizer and Barry Render delve into the topic of blockchain, which is a topic in Chapter 11, Supply Chain Management. We will talk about its cryptocurrency origins and the work of Gerber, Nestle, Unilever, Walmart, and IBM to create a blockchain system called Food Trust. We also discuss blockchain’s shortcomings and how both shipping giant Maersk and retail giant Walmart have had to cut back on their original goals dramatically.

 

Instructors, assignable auto-graded exercises using this podcast are available in MyLab OM.  Contact your Pearson rep to learn more!  https://www.pearson.com/us/contact-us/find-your-rep.html

See you every two weeks in our new podcast series. Next up, on April 24th, is a discussion about the formidable task of managing large projects, which ties into Chapter 3 of our OM text.

OM in the News: Blockchain Fails to Gain Traction

Blockchain, the technology underpinning bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, for years has been viewed by some companies as a way to drive industry-transforming projects, among them the tracking of assets through complex supply chains. So far, that hasn’t happened, writes The Wall Street Journal (Dec. 16, 2022).

We have followed the topic (Chapter 11, pages 451-2 in your Heizer/Render/Munson text) relentlessly, with 22 blogs over the past few years. To review them, enter “blockchain” in the search box on the right.

Maersk and IBM discontinued a blockchain-based program to track shipments

The latest effort to run aground was that of Maersk and IBM, which hoped to follow shipments via the blockchain. Another big effort, Walmart’s attempt to track groceries on the blockchain, continues, but very slowly.

“There’s not one company that has really shown, let’s say, a material change,” said Moody’s VP, of blockchain efforts in supply chains. It has been slow going or worse for big bets on blockchain for a number of reasons: the complexity of the technology, the time required to get a blockchain into operation and the difficulties in enlisting participants.

TradeLens, the Maersk- IBM blockchain platform, was launched in 2018 to help digitize container shipping on a secure global tracking platform. Had it worked, it would have been a game-changer, cutting down on paperwork to clear customs and offering cargo owners more visibility of their boxes during transit.

In 2018, Walmart partnered with IBM to start tracking its produce items through blockchain. The effort began with leafy greens, and in the four years since has added just one more item: green bell peppers. Walmart said it took time to get buy-in from suppliers who found the onboarding process daunting. Many didn’t have digital record-keeping systems and had to make large upfront investments before they could start using blockchain.

“There used to be a time, 4 years ago, every interview that I would get into, the question was about blockchain and how’s UPS going to use blockchain. Are you guys going to solve all the problems in the world with blockchain?” says a former UPS exec. “It’s been a long time since anyone has asked me about blockchain,” he added. “It never really took off in my world.”

Classroom discussion questions:

  1. Describe exactly how blockchain works.
  2. Why has blockchain faltered?

 

 

OM in the News: Blockchain on the Seas

As discussed on pages 453 and 586 of the text, blockchains have huge potential to add efficiency and security to operations. Two major European ship operators have just joined a blockchain platform formed by Maersk and IBM, in a significant boost for the adoption of the technology across the logistics industry, reports The Wall Street Journal (May 28, 2019).

The addition of France’s CMA CGM and Swiss’s Mediterranean Shipping to the effort called TradeLens means the 3 carriers that control 1/2 of all seaborne containerized cargo capacity will make the movement of freight in international supply chains more transparent and potentially generate substantial annual savings.

Maersk and IBM in 2016 kicked off the blockchain platform for container ships, which carry the vast majority of consumer goods, furniture, manufacturing parts and other basics of global commerce. Large companies such as Walmart, P&G and DuPont, along with 100 ports, have been testing the technology to get a better view of their supply chains, from raw materials to finished goods.

For ocean carriers, the blockchain technology allows trusted participants to share information as goods move through supply chains. The system also promises to reduce the cost of paperwork. Maersk said the cost of the required documentation to process and administer many of the goods shipped each year makes up 1/5 of the actual physical transportation costs.

The French carrier’s decision to join TradeLens  is “a signal that the whole notion of blockchain tourism is over and that we are at a tipping point for scale where participants will share data in a trusted fashion,” said an IBM exec.

Classroom discussion questions:

  1. Explain how blockchain works.
  2. What impact is blockchain intended to have on this industry?

OM in the News: IBM and Maersk Apply Blockchain to Shipping

Shipping giant Maersk and IBM formed a joint venture using blockchain

Shipping giant Maersk is the latest company jump onto the blockchain train, entering a joint venture with IBM to create a more efficient and secure platform for organizing global trade using blockchain technology, writes The Wall Street Journal (Jan. 17, 2018). The platform could be used to streamline operations for the entire global shipping ecosystem. The idea came from the current stack of paperwork needed to process and track the shipping of goods. The cost of the required trade documentation to process and administer many of the goods shipped each year is estimated to reach 1/5 of the actual physical transportation costs.

The companies said blockchain, the technology behind increasingly popular cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, is ideal for organizing large networks with different partners like the shipping industry, which transports more that $4 trillion goods a year. “The potential from offering a neutral, open digital platform for safe and easy ways of exchanging information is huge, and all players across the supply chain stand to benefit,” said a top Maersk exec.

More corporations, including General Motors and P&G , are exploring ways to use it to streamline supply chains and customs clearance. Singaporean and Peruvian customs also are exploring collaborating with the platform to facilitate trade flows and enhance supply chain security.

The move comes as Maersk and IBM have been attempting to reinvent themselves. IBM, the 106-year-old technology giant, has been looking to new lines of business, including blockchain, as sales in its legacy business of selling hardware and software slow. Maersk has been trying to transform itself to into a global supply-chain major like UPS and FedEx by integrating its transport and logistics units.

Classroom discussion questions:

  1. What is blockchain and why is it important in OM?
  2. How does blockchain relate to supply chains?

 

Video Tip: Maersk’s Floating Empire State Buildings

maerskBreakfast in your home is a global affair. While your eggs may be from a nearby farm, your cooking pan could be from Germany, the refrigerator, toaster, and table from China, the fruit salad from 4-5 different countries, your newspaper from Indonesian wood pulp, and the coffee from Ethiopia. Regardless of national origin, pretty much all of it came from outside your town, by means ranging from 1,200-foot-long container vessel to railroad to truck. And that’s just breakfast. For all of our activities, the average American requires the movement of 57 tons of cargo per year!

“Ninety percent of the world’s freight goes by sea, and the vessels that transport it are the largest vehicles on Earth,” writes The Atlantic-CityLab (Oct.2, 2014).  The more containers that can fit on a ship (measured in 20-foot equivalent units, or TEUs), the cheaper it is to move them. Today, the Triple E class container ships built for Maersk Line are the world’s largest ships. The Triple E class can hold 18,000 TEUs, enough to transport 111 million pairs of sneakers, or enough to shoe over 1/3 of the U.S. in a single trip. The Triple E is 1,300 feet long (which is the height of the Empire State building), 194 feet wide, and 240 feet high. This 6 minute video provides a perfect interface when you discuss logistics in Chapter 11.

As ships bring bigger swells of goods and ask for quicker turnaround times, the ports are focusing on how to get those goods off the ship and on the roads or rails faster. So while ships are maximizing economies, ports are focusing on efficiency. At this point, rail proves to be the most efficient mode of land transport. In 2013, railroads moved a ton of freight an average of 473 miles on a single gallon of diesel fuel. Rail is widely considered to be 3-4 times more fuel efficient than trucks, and especially vital for moving bulk cargo—2/3 of U.S. coal shipments move by rail, for example.