To build this baseline, the Accenture team met with the global supplier’s country managers and global supply chain operations staff, gathering 12 months of global, regional, and local data on product prices and costs, demand and supply, and transportation expenses.
Feeding the data collected into Llamasoft’s Supply Chain Guru, a sophisticated network optimization software tool, Accenture worked with the client to create a model of the company’s existing supply chain operations. This detailed baseline model would serve as the foundation for the scenario planning phase of the project, during which the Accenture team used Llamasoft to develop a wide range of possible scenarios for the company’s new distribution network and help the supplier choose the option that would generate the greatest value.
However, devising a new distribution model was only part of the solution to the company’s inventory and supply chain challenges. Accenture also suggested a host of organizational changes and capability improvements to drive substantial and ongoing results.