Integrated Supply Chain Intelligence through Collaborative Planning, Analytics and Monitoring

As supply chains are growing increasingly complex, from linear arrangements to interconnected, multi-echelon, collaborative networks of companies, there is much more information that needs to be stored and analyzed than there was just a few years ago. Today, there are variety of business initiatives and technologies such as joint planning and execution, business intelligence, performance management, data mining and alerting that can be used for more efficient supply chain management. However, organizations still lack methods, processes and tools to successfully design and implement these systems. In this chapter, the authors present the integrated supply chain intelligence (SCI) system that enables collaborative planning and decision making through web-based analytics and process monitoring. The system is process based and utilizes business intelligence and Internet technologies. Multi-layered and service-oriented architecture enables composition of the new breed of SCI applications. They describe main elements and capabilities of the system, its advantages over existing systems and also discuss future research trends and opportunities.