A major Chinese biotech in 2021 was still a start-up company with a critical need to determine its supply chain strategy, set-up and associated processes. Its first product was due for launch later that year.
Given the stage of the company’s development, there was a lack of depth of supply chain knowledge, few mature processes and little quality data available. A new supply chain team was being recruited, but outside help was needed to accelerate the supply chain strategy project and give greater insight to the various scenarios faced. Time was of the essence as senior management was anxious to have a supply chain blueprint to form a key building block of the overall company strategy and accelerate the company’s development.
There were conflicting requirements of:
- flexibility – supply chain was going to change considerably in the next few years, so there were multiple scenarios.
- simplicity – it needed to be easily understood by other disciplines so that their contribution could be maximised.
- speed to implement – target was to have a working supply chain model in a few weeks for presentation to senior management.
We engaged Supply Chain Operations with the remit to help in the following key areas:
- Support to the global Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP) set-up with a pragmatic and short-term implementation tool to do planning, give control and provide visibility.
- Provide training to the relevant team members in the tool so that they could take over the running of the tool and embed it into the S&OP process.
- Support to the launch footprint design (physical & financial flows, SCM & QA/QP regulatory requirements) especially in EMEA region.
The results achieved in a few weeks were outstanding:
- A flexible supply chain framework was developed that could be assessed and further revised vs. the changing business model (new tax structures, different routes to market etc.)
- The modelling tool developed enabled the S&OP process to be formalised and provide input to the business. This enabled some basic scenario planning to take place in an effective and timely manner.
Supply Chain Operations not only provided the technical input, but also gave us impartial advice on several strategic options for the business. As the strategy and model developed, the adaptability of the modelling tool came to the fore, supported by high quality expertise drawing upon SCO’s multi-faceted experience in similar situations with regular and precise communication despite the tight deadlines and many time zones involved.
I would highly recommend SCO as the partner to develop your supply chain.