May 20, 2020

Improvement of Supply Chain Management Processes

Achieving Transparency in Automotive Supply Chains
Ute Burkhardt

Automotive supply chains encompass the entire world. The Demand and Capacity Management (DCM) is subject to enormous complexity, as thousands of orders with thousands of parts from hundreds of suppliers must be considered. To improve DCM systems in automotive supply chains, Volkswagen, thyssenkrupp and Fraunhofer Institute for Software and Systems Engineering ISST are reaching out for data sovereignty. 

The industrial partners mutually aim to optimize supply chains in terms of transparency, efficiency and sustainability, assisted by the IDS. The idea is to make supply chains resilient and firm; long-term objectives become realistic by putting sensitive data, such as stocks, output volumes and production programs in bidirectional correlation. IDS represents the technological basis for that type of data exchange, supporting data sovereignty between organizations whilst complying high-level safety requirements.

Establishing Trust by Using Technology

Trust is one of the highest rated requirements for collaboration in industrial environments, such as material provider and productive consumer, e.g. automotive production. Especially when exchange of sensitive data is required, trust is not sufficient due to the fact that access to IT systems is sometimes outside of human’s control. A technical solution is mostly required to ensure data sovereignty on both ends, establishing trust by using technology. This makes critical data available for specific planning purposes and improves the transparency, efficiency and sustainability in supply chains.

Benefits

  1. Exchange and usage of data leads to process improvement
  2. Increased transparency in automotive supply chains
  3. Policy enforcement enables mutual trust

Companies and organizations involved

  • Fraunhofer Institute for Software and Systems Engineering ISST
  • Volkswagen Konzernlogistik GmbH & Co. OHG
  • thyssenkrupp Presta Ilsenburg GmbH

Technological architecture or IDS components used 

  • IDS Connector
  • IDS Connector Framework

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Author: Ute Burkhardt
Ute Burkhardt, Project Manager SCM at Volkswagen Konzernlogistik GmbH & Co. OHG

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