Technology and Process Analysis Uncovers Critical Supply Chain and S&OP Opportunities for Leading Food Manufacturer

Accelytics offers a free Technology and Process Analysis (TPA) to help clients determine how to optimize their supply chain, sales and financial planning processes to gain a competitive advantage, improve the bottom line and run more efficiently. In this article, we will summarize the findings from a recent analysis done for a leading food manufacturer that uncovered critical supply chain and S&OP opportunities, as well as key Anaplan model improvements.

Client Overview:

This food manufacturer is a Canadian based producer of premium bakery items with an innovative history dating back to 1882. They distribute across North American stores and food service outlets with over $2.1B in revenue each year.

The food manufacturer recently implemented Anaplan for demand and supply planning, however, the company noticed the software was not completely optimized for their needs. Along with Anaplan improvement, the company was also seeking expert guidance on best business practices throughout demand, supply and S&OP planning activities.

TPA Summary:

Within a two-week time frame, two expert consultants from Accelytics worked closely with the company to perform a Technology and ProcessAnalysis. The analysis covered:

Evaluation of the current business environment, processes and technology
Mapping the current business processes
Benchmarking against the competition
Determining root causes and offering solutions on high-priority opportunities
Providing a new optimized process map
Technology analysis and use case implementation roadmap
An ROI analysis using client data, reports, and operational KPIs for value realization and project justification

With the TPA, Accelytics uncovered not only Anaplan inefficiencies, but, process improvements throughout demand, supply and S&OP planning activities, which is something that was not completed with the initial Anaplan implementation.

TPA Findings:

By holding workshops with key members of the food manufacturer’s team, Accelytics gained an understanding of the current processes and technology functions. Once we had this information, we used APQC, internal databases and Accelytics’ knowledge base to benchmark their processes against the competition. This helps us to determine the highest impact areas of improvement and where the competition is excelling.

Benchmarking Highlights:

Demand Planning – Operating at 55% below competition

Accelytics identified 11 key areas of improvement in Demand Planning through the benchmarking analysis. The main concern lies within the demand planning process having no consistency across business units. Standardization of multiple data and statistical processes needs to be implemented across the entire company, as well as sharing data and forecasts between demand and supply planning.

Top 5 Areas of Improvement for Demand Planning:

Improve Demand Planning process for consistency and best practices
Implement Standard Outlier Correction for baseline forecasting
Demand signal communication for supply planning and reporting
Incorporate offline Excel processes into Anaplan
Improve Composite Score Best Fit Method for statistical modeling

Supply Planning – Operating at 26% below competition

Accelytics identified 7 key areas of opportunity in Supply Planning. The food manufacturer was falling short in several areas, such as not performing scenario management, not using the capacity modeling to complexity and manually doing work in Excel, instead of through Anaplan.

Top 5 Areas of Improvement in Supply Planning:

Improve Supply Planning for consistency and best practices
Create optimized inventory management process in Anaplan
Rebuild of Capacity Constraint Logic at MPS level
Evaluate Capacity, Scenario, Demand and other scenario practices in the supply model
Improve Consumption Logic from demand to supply to include backlog forecast and allow for pull in and push out with planner controls

S&OP – Operating at 48% below competition

The analysis found 5 key areas of improvement for S&OP activities. The food manufacturer currently had no formalized process for all 5 S&OP steps in Anaplan. There was no 'What-If' and Scenario planning being practiced for sales and operations and reporting and KPIs were not outlined or tracked.

Top 5 Areas of Improvement:

Formalize S&OP process for 5 steps in Anaplan
Enable snapshots, comments and collaboration for executive review to include various scenarios
Rapid What-If capabilities connected for demand through supply
End of Life best practices implemented to show financial impact
Define reporting and KPIs to track progress in Anaplan

Anaplan Technology – Operating at 39% below competition

With the food manufacturer already having an Anaplan model, the TPA was used to identify space, performance and user-adoption opportunities. Accelytics found 13 total areas of improvement. The largest areas of opportunity were within data quality and management, as well as user interface, main hierarchies and model organization.The suggested changes will not only create an easier navigation throughout Anaplan, but reduce the model size significantly.

Value Realization

After mapping out a new, optimized process flow for demand, supply and S&OP planning, Accelytics provided a full technology roadmap for implementation. With the 3 use cases and Anaplan improvements, implementation was mapped out in 3 spreads, totaling 8-10 months for a full optimized solution.

Demand Planning: 16 weeks
Supply Planning: 18 weeks
S&OP: 10 weeks

Using the food manufacturers operational KPIs to use cases, Accelytics found the ROI potential to be $5.11M within the first year after implementation. With the use cases accounting for:

Excess and Obsolete: $2.25M
Forecast Accuracy: $1.5M
Fill Rate: $81K
Days of Supply: $2.6M

By using the TPA, the food manufacturer discovered they can have a fully optimized Anaplan model for demand, supply and S&OP planning within 10 months and save over $5 million with the suggested changes. Accelytics not only delivers expertly optimized process improvements, but also outlines a sustainable technology implementation roadmap to help our clients see how they can gain a competitive advantage and attain a significant ROI.

Looking to Uncover Your Company's Opportunities?

If you're interested to see if your company qualifies for our Free Technology and Process Analysis, fill out the form below and a consultant will be happy to contact you!

Back to all