NITIE-Mumbai Organizes 'Samiksha 2008' on Supply Chain Excellence

NITIE-Mumbai Organizes 'Samiksha 2008' on Supply Chain Excellence

The opening Samiksha of this year saw the industrial engineers at NITIE go back to their core competency and discuss the challenges faced by supply chain managers of today.

The afternoon of 21 August 2008 saw the convergence of experience, expertise and inquisitiveness in the lush green environs of NITIE as a panel discussion on "Supply Chain Excellence: Critical Driver for Bottom-Line Performance" commenced. The panel was graced by three representatives from the industry leaders in different segments - Mr. Amit Baweja, CM, Logistics, Asian Paints, Mr. Ankur Bhagat, India Marketing Planning Manager, P&G, and Mr. Jayanta Chatterjee, GM, Customer Service Fulfillment Division, Castrol India Ltd.

Mr. Amit Baweja talked about the complexities of Asian Paints Supply Chain in terms of uncertain demand, diversity of material sources, large vendor base, etc., and stimulated thought on the trade-off between a complex supply chain and low-cost good service. He dwelt on different challenges like balancing investor expectations with customer demands, managing a steadily rising number of SKUs, dealing with the Hockey Stick Effect, etc.

Speaking of the challenges that Castrol India faced after their association with British Petroleum, Mr. Jayanta Chatterjee explained how the company worked to ensure no accidents, no harm to people, and no damage to environment. Meeting these goals while ensuring the profitability of the business was a real task, one that Castrol India achieved thanks to a planned and well thought approach and a dedicated team.

Mr. Ankur Bhagat's talk centred around better consumer understanding and of shaping the sullpy chain to meet consumer expectations. He talked about the "Golden Eye" model that P&G adopted some time back to deal with their distribution network. He further deliberated on the different measures that could be taken to streamline the supply chain and to make it more agile and responsive.

The discussion that ensued after the speakers' presentations threw up various issues like environment awareness as the new buzzword in supply chains world over, inventory issues at the time of new product launch, handling of special offers, modern retail, etc. The moderator of the discussion, Mr. Krishna Kant, Head Research, ET Intelligence Group, The Economic Times, also chipped in with his queries and concerns for the industry in general.

With active participation from the audience, the discussion proved to be an enlightening one for all participants and the effort was appreciated by one and all.

Concluded.

Contributed by -
Rashmi Panwar,
PGDIE Class of 2009,
Media Team,
NITIE Mumbai.