“Disruptive Inventory Management Technology” for “Disruptive Weather”
We do not always immediately recognize “Disruptive Technology” when we see it, but we certainly can all recognize “Disruptive Weather” when it impacts our businesses. The latest arctic blast brought a new meaning to supply chain disruptions to much of our country.
Spend Matters defines disruptive technology as “a change driven by technology that transforms or displaces solutions, processes, etc., across a supply chain or parts of it.” Recent disruptive technology examples of course include e-commerce, ride-sharing apps, and the GPS system. More recent ones include Blockchain, Robotics, Internet of Things (IoT), and Peer-to-peer connectivity.
Although not close to the above examples as disrupters, an argument could be made that utilizing RFID technology for real-time inventory management has created the ability to truly disrupt how companies manage their inventory. By allowing your supplier to mitigate the risk of running out of critical supply items while at the same time reducing your team's need to constantly track inventory levels, companies using real-time inventory methods would typically agree it meets the basic definition of disruptive technology.
We recently experienced an example of this when disruptive weather in the form of cold, snow, and icy roads hit various parts of the country. With SupplySentry, we can see the exact inventory levels on hand at each location and in hearing the weather outlook, we were able to help plan accordingly. Knowing shipments would take a day or two extra in certain areas, we made sure to give additional time for the shipments to get delivered. We also watched each shipment very closely to ensure the material was being delivered before there are any possible stock issues.
APR’s SupplySentry real-time inventory solution for managing pressroom related items such as mounting tapes, doctor blades, and miscellaneous supplies is “Disruptive Technology” that eliminates the possible disruption caused with more traditional ways to manage this inventory or, worse yet, the severe disruption created when nearly running out of one of these critical supplies.
SupplySentry customers experience improved efficiencies, increased inventory control, elimination of misplaced items, and responsiveness because of the increased end-to-end visibility that SupplySentry provides.