The following posting can also be viewed and commented upon on the Supply Chain Expert Community web site.

This posting continues highlights of the Kinexions 2011 conference being held this week in Scottsdale Arizona.  Readers can also reference our prior Dispatch One , Dispatch Two and Dispatch Three commentaries.

One of the new twists to this year’s Kinexions conference was an invitation for a broader group of industry analysts / partners / bloggers to not only partake of the conference but also attend a separate afternoon briefing session hosted by Kinaxis senior management and select customers. Seldom have I found software vendors willing to allow this grouping open access, and we complement Kinaxis for this effort.  As COO John Sicard explained to me, the company has reached a point where it requires broader market awareness of its capabilities.

The influencer briefing kicked-off with CEO Doug Colbeth and COO John Sicard jointly providing a history of the company both in its fabric and its technology development. Emphasis was placed on the current demonstrated scalability of RapidResponse and an acknowledgement that the application works best when in coexistence of existing ERP or legacy systems among its customers. Nearly 60 percent of Kinaxis existing customer base operate with an SAP ERP backbone system.  Also explained was that when users interact with RapidResponse they declare their work area responsibility, which the application then utilizes to tailor respective planning views. The application not only manages and processes large amounts of data, but also the business rules that exist regarding that data.  In our view, that characterizes RapidResponse as akin to a business process management (BPM) type of application, which the application accomplishes in its S&OP functionality. We were also briefed on why the new announced re-naming to Kinaxis RapidResponse Supply Chain Control Tower was a natural extension of the company’s current growth plans.  Although there was a on-stage demo, not a lot of information was shared in this session regarding the detailed functionality that is being planned for this extension of RapidResponse capabilities.

The remainder of the influencer briefing session focused on interaction and presentations from invited customers. Elisabeth Kaszas, Director of Supply Chain for Amgen, provided an update on that company’s multi-year transformational efforts towards more responsive supply chain business processes. A benefit mentioned, that was rather difficult to do in the existing ERP backbone system,was the need to provide various product costing structures beyond just standard cost data.

Chalam Kalahasti, Director of Global Planning and Fulfillment for Cisco Systems, described the unique challenges for planning a highly outsourced, globally extended supply chain.  Cisco has a very active S&OP process tied to RapidResponse, and a plan-of-record is created weekly. What is also noteworthy is that Cisco’s direction in more response-oriented planning has been motivated by previous incidents of supply chain disruption, such as earthquakes in Taiwan and China and the tsunami in northern Japan.  Cisco’s supply chain planning process is predicated on the ability to assess a definitive impact from an unplanned event and to provide different options and scenarios for responding to the exception.

Paul Lindblom, a member of the senior IT staff at Qualcomm QCT, provided a detailed perspective of how RapidResponse integrates with various other Qualcomm systems, along with the unique needs for planning in a combination push-pull, semiconductor supply chain.  Semiconductor wafers are long lead-time items subject to fab capacity considerations, and in the case of Qualcomm, multiple fabs are utilized to supply product.  Conversely, wafer packaging and testing are driven by customer buying and lead-time requirement cycles. Semiconductor planning needs which requires the unique ability to be supported for by-product and co-product production are supported in RapidResponse.

Due to time constraints, our final session featured Kerry Zuber of Kinaxis who provided an overview of the latest 10.0 release of RapidResponse, which includes a significant investment in demand management and product forecasting functionality.

Our briefing turned out to be a jam-packed session with a literal fire-hose of information.  Luckily, the customer appreciation event held on a reservation in the hills outside of Phoenix allowed ample opportunity to unwind and have great conversations with fellow attendees.

In a final posting, Supply Chain Matters will provide some final summary comments and observations regarding the Kinexions 2011 conference.

Bob Ferrari

Added Note: Kinaxis is one of other named sponsors of the Supply Chain Matters blog and the author provides services to this vendor.

The following posting can also be viewed and commented on the Supply Chain Expert Community web site.

This posting continues highlights of the Kinexions 2011 conference being held this week in Scottsdale Arizona.  Readers can also reference our prior Dispatch One and Dispatch Two commentaries  which highlight day one activities.

Day two of Kinexions kicked off with an uncensored presentation from former Gartner Vice President and supply chain sage Kevin O’Marah, who now characterizes himself as an independent thinker.  Kevin reflected on the history of business automation and innovation, the important trends that productivity and talent have brought to businesses large and small and his belief that large ERP vendors are not delivering the innovation required to enable the next era of business and supply chain process capabilities. Kevin referenced multiple survey data that reinforces that demand volatility is driving executives and supply chains literally crazy, and that the community needs to get ahead of these new realities of business. Kevin described the new wave as being led by human intelligence but with technology leverage.  Kevin was also kind enough to acknowledge our working relationship in the earlier days of AMR Research and I sincerely thank Kevin for the mention.

Day two customer presentations featured Lalit Pandit, the CIO of D&M Holdings, and Joe McBeth, Vice President of Global Supply Chain at Jabil, and Erwin Hermans, Vice President of Supply Chain Solutions, Celestica.  One of the extraordinary aspects of attending a Kinexions conference is that the audience can get perspectives from the key players located throughout many tiers of today’s global supply chain. The D&M Holdings story is one of a mid-market company that needed to transform its supply chain utilizing a planning and response management application that users could quickly adopt and leverage.  It is also an example of how a cloud offering is an important option for mid-market companies.

While there were many nuggets of information shared by all of today’s presenters, my personal favorite was Jim McBeth, who vividly expressed what supply chain response management really means for companies, and especially contract manufacturers. Jim reflected on the recent March earthquake involving northern Japan, and more recently, the devastating floods impacting Thailand.  Each had supply chain disruption implications, and as Jim best described it, “the guy who was the best information, wins”. In 48 hours, Jabil was able to provide risk assessments and impact analysis for its OEM customers and key suppliers. Jim noted that most organizations, consultants and pundits speak to constantly keeping inventory down, when the reality may be keeping partners in balance and inventory right-sized to buffer identified areas of component risk. Jim also spoke to the reality of planning at the EMS level, the mid-tier of high tech value chains when the bigger fish OEM’s will get the prime priority for available inventory and capacity. The reality turns out to be the ability to plan with predictive data, to proactively collaborate with OEM’s along with the ability to predict what requirements will be before the bigger players do the same.

This afternoon’s closing event was an interactive influencer’s panel discussion moderated by Trevor Miles of Kinaxis, which I was honored to be invited to participate.  Fellow panelists were Andy Coldrick, one of the original thought leaders in S&OP, Russell Goodman, editor-in-chief, SupplyChainBrain, and Predrang (PJ) Jakovljevic of Technology Evaluation Center.  Our goal was to wrap-up the conference by summarizing what we heard from customers and influencers, how we viewed the current state of  supply chain business process and technology innovation, and the notion of what is the state of collaboration in supply chains. A eureka moment came from an interchange of what comes next for S&OP?  Andy provided the perspective that as the originators of S&OP discussed what would be the next iterations, they also could not agree to terminology.  Andy’s charge to the audience, it doesn’t matter how you term the next iteration, what matters more is the objective your organization is seeking. Wise words from an original thought leader.

Supply Chain Matters will feature two additional Kinexions commentaries, one reflecting on this year’s briefing of key market influencers, and our conference summary impressions.

Bob Ferrari

Added Note: Kinaxis is one of other named sponsors of the Supply Chain Matters blog and the author provides services to this vendor.