Product Type: Market Research Report
Published by: Datamonitor
Published: October 2006
Product Code: R313-17200Description Introduction
Manufacturers are facing problems stemming from poor tracking of materials and stock within their production facilities. Now, these companies are looking to implement a range of strategies to ensure that costs are minimized and the level of service maximized.
Scope- This brief looks at outsourcing as a viable strategy for manufacturers and discusses where gains can be made, and some of the challenges associated.
- Task or transaction interleaving is a strategy that makes sense for a lot of industry outsiders, yet is proving hard to implement in the warehouse.
- Cross docking is on the lips of many manufacturers and distributors as it provides a way to significantly reduce inventory holding costs.
- As ever, technology will play a large part in helping manufacturers solve their inventory management issues.
Highlights
Outsourcing has been a recurrent theme within the manufacturing industry for a number of years now, and it stands to reason that for warehousing, the same general principles apply. Logistics outsourcing in particular has been a key growth area within the industry with many companies now engaged in such contracts.
Reasons to Purchase- Understand what business strategies manufacturers are implementing to see where they will need help most.
- Assess the opportunity for technology within manufacturing strategies to more closely target key pain points.
Table of Contents - DATAMONITOR VIEW
- CATALYST
- SUMMARY
- METHODOLOGY
- ANALYSIS
- Outsourcing warehouse processes can reduce cost and improve quality of service
- Shared space - pay for what you use - allows greater scalability
- Increased visibility can be a benefit of warehouse outsourcing
- Warehousing providers are able to provide a higher level of service
- Task interleaving lets manufacturers reduce travel time and associated costs
- Task interleaving combines multiple function lists
- The benefits of interleaving are significant
- Interleaving can help cut costs and improve flow-through
- Manufacturers can focus on different processes using priority based interleaving
- Cross docking seeks to reduce inventory holding and picking costs
- Cross docking effectively removes the need for inventory storage and picking
- There are multiple challenges associated with cross docking
- Through cross docking manufacturers can drastically reduce costs and improve cycle times
- Technology is helping manufacturers support warehouse and stock-related strategies
- A range of options are available to manufacturers looking to streamline warehouse and stock processes
- Vendor activity in the warehousing area has been mixed
- APPENDIX
- Definitions
- References
- Extended methodology
- Further reading
- Ask the analyst
- List of Figures
- Figure 1: Task interleaving can significantly reduce travel time
- Figure 2: Task interleaving integrates several 'to-do' lists (simplified)
- Figure 3: Distribution cross docking relies upon a sorting area to redistribute shipments
- Figure 4: Cross docking processes focus on reducing put-away and picking
|
|
