Business to Business

Internal paper

Submitted to:
Ms.Sufia Asar Khan

Submitted by:
Naveen Kumar PGP 07-09 B2B-1

Objective:- To understand how information technology could be effectively

used to enhance the efficiency of the supply chain by reducing cost.

Theory:Information flow-

A process which indexed product movements in the store to over a thousand store and market traits Using inventory and sales data Security of dataWal-Mart has built the company in large part on its efficient supply chain and inventory management. All of that is driven by, and dependent on, the flow of information. Because of the potential impact of an event like Sept. 11 on this flow, are you doing anything differently in business continuity planning or disaster recovery?
Unfortunately, we are doing things differently as a result of Sept. 11, and I say unfortunately because were investing a lot of money, resources and time in security, privacy and similar activities. Things that were once objectives and goals are now a way of life. Thats really the transition thats happened for us since 9/11. Were going to be burdened with it for quite some time. Id really like to see our technology vendors step up and help us with these vulnerabilities because the money that were pouring into security right now is being pulled away from development and strategic things that we could be investing in. A lot of the vulnerabilities that we deal with are preventable and could be avoided if the technology vendors would get proactive and do the due diligence to tighten up their products.

Electronic scanning of uniform product code (UPC) at the POS Ensure accurate pricing Improve efficiency Reduce Shrinkage Improve communications Material flow:-

Phenomenal distribution network Computerized pick to light system Cost advantage

 Stable price

Non-unionized Decentralized: full autonomy Profit sharing program Yes we can Sam Store within store Shrink incentive Stock sharing

 Two step hub-and-spoke

Administrative style Frugality No hierarchy in organization

Whole Supply chain Economies of scale Cost leadership competitive advantage JIT inventor POS and retail link CRS & VMI EDI CPFR Backward integration No nonsense negotiator Economies of scale Maintain long term relationship with supplier, as powerful partner (RSP

 Electronic data interchange (EDI) CPFR Forecasting Planning Replenishing Shipping applications Vendor-managed inventory (VMI) system Wrangler GE From EDI to Retail link Methodology:- secondary data Sources-1.internet 2.magazines

Analysis:Radio frequency identification is also exciting, and were working with MIT on the development of "cheap chips." I think that you will see cheap chips replace bar codes over time, and well be able to intelligently drive the supply chain through whats on the shelf and whats in the back without our associates having to verify it. Voice over IP will certainly take off and will lower costs and help us all from an infrastructure standpoint. We all know what its like today when an associate moves or transfers and you have to change the phones. Theyll simply be able to take the phone with them, plug it back in, and everything will be working without any systemic changes. I think voice recognitions time will come in the next three years. We have not scratched the surface with this technology in retail and certainly not yet at Wal-Mart. We are using some voice recognition technology in our distribution centers, but I think you will continue to see more and more areas where its exploited, and it will eliminate the need for some of the mobile computing we do in our stores, clubs and distribution centers today.

From a development standpoint, I think the biggest opportunity we have is leveraging information. In the future, we should actually be simulating our business with an inductive model versus a deductive model to determine our opportunities to maximize sales before the actual event occurs. An example would be, say, that we start running Easter [simulations] in December so that we can better prepare and know what the Easter business will look like. Were really excited about the potential for predictive information and simulation.
Weve also got a strategic initiative going on with self-service. We are working to provide self-service technology for our associates, prospective associates, customers and members, and to eliminate paper and paper forms. Having an associate portal and devices on our sales floors will let customers and members get product information, and let us do computer-assisted selling.

Conclusion:Wal-Marts supply chain management practices resulted in increased efficiency in operations and better customer service. It eliminated old stocks and maintained quality of goods. Bar coding and radio frequency technologies enabled accurate distribution of goods. Cross-docking also helped Wal-Mart to reduce inventory storage costs. It also helped to cut down the labor and other