Every year, Gartner publishes the main ranking of evaluation of excellence in supply chain management in the world and on 19/05 the results were announced. results of the 2021 edition of the Supply Chain Top 25. The ranking encompasses the world's largest companies and is made up of two different approaches: a quantitative measurement of business performance (assessing metrics such as return on physical assets, inventory turnover and revenue growth) and a qualitative assessment based on expert opinions. consultancy and global peers of the analyzed companies.
The 5 Top 2021 remained the same from the 2020 ranking, with Cisco remaining in the top position.
Figure 1: Supply Chain Management Top 25 2021
Source: Gartner. Adaptation: ILOS
During the evaluation, Gartner identified 3 main and common trends among the companies present in the ranking:
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- Purpose-driven organization: companies are increasingly committed to social, environmental and governance aspects. Some examples of initiatives in this regard include optimization of the logistics network to remove vehicles from the streets and reduce carbon emissions, reuse of heat from upstream manufacturing processes to supply energy to downstream links, use of recyclable and compostable materials, creative solutions to increase transport density and products being designed to ensure greater circularity while others are designed to generate a smaller environmental footprint for the customer. In addition to sustainability, many organizations have increased their focus on diversity, equity and inclusion in their teams and are fighting more strongly against social issues such as racism, homophobia, sexism and xenophobia.
- Customer-facing business transformation: The Covid-19 pandemic has generated supply disruptions, larger than normal demand swings and an accelerated level of business model transformation, requiring supply chains to be highly adaptive. In this sense, many traditional channels began to serve the consumer directly, reducing the need for intermediate links in the chain, which helped to increase their demand visibility. On the retail side, the increase in e-commerce orders required significant investments in the automation of distribution centers to be able to handle the picking of more fractional orders. Another effect of this consumer movement was the increase in the cost of last-mile deliveries for companies, leading to innovations and new partnerships, such as the sharing of omnichannel spaces in shopping malls and physical stores for special sales and return of trade products. electronic. To address the problems of lack of production capacity, many companies have also significantly reduced their product portfolio, eliminating the SKUs known as the long tail that have been introduced over years of operation without a subsequent assessment of the real gains brought by them. they.
- Digital Transformation: digitization and intensive use of technology is a hallmark of reference companies in supply chain management in the world. Artificial intelligence and machine learning are increasingly being used to analyze supply constraints in real time and balance market share, profit and strategic business objectives. In transport, some companies already dynamically monitor and manage shipments, acting in advance on deliveries with a high chance of delay, aiming to keep the commitments made with the customer as much as possible. Shop floor automation continues in manufacturing environments, and leading companies are remotely and centrally monitoring their factories. Key business model changes have also accelerated automation in distribution and fulfillment centers over the past 12 months. To extract all the benefits from these technologies, companies have also invested in training programs for their teams so that they learn to better interpret the enormous amount of data and analyzes generated by the systems and are able to make better decisions in their functions.
Speaking specifically of the leading company in the ranking, strong revenue growth, strength in environmental, social and governance (ESG) initiatives and recognition of leadership in community opinion polls propelled Cisco to the top spot for the second year in a row. Cisco's agility has helped the company prioritize videoconferencing and critical infrastructure capabilities for hospitals and vaccine research over the past year. In addition, sustainability requirements are built into Cisco's supply chain to help ensure continuous improvement and drive impactful change. In 2016, Cisco set aggressive targets for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions through 2020. Having achieved the targets a year ahead of schedule, the company has further tightened the targets for 2025.
In second place was Colgate-Palmolive, which already occupied the top of the ranking in 2019 and has been a reference for years in supply chain management. The company continues to drive supply chain transformation using customer segmentation strategies, adopting new business models (e-commerce, for example) and investing in digitalization. In addition, Colgate-Palmolive has remained steadfast in its commitment to reducing environmental waste, and today 13 of its factories have the highest level of recognition by the US Green Building Council.
Johnson & Johnson closed the podium of the ranking in 2021. In addition to also making a strong commitment to social, environmental and governance issues, the company stands out for the innovation, agility and resilience of its supply chain. Another major concern at J&J is to always seek the greatest possible match between demand and supply. To do this, using data science and complex algorithms, the company automatically monitors hundreds of thousands of orders placed by large customers such as medical centers and governments. If the algorithm detects an unusual pattern, it immediately alerts supply chain professionals, who promptly investigate the causes of the deviation and act to avoid service gaps or excess inventory.
Just as Gartner presents the reference supply chain companies in the world, for 27 years the ILOS organize and carry out International Supply Chain Forum with the aim of presenting and discussing good supply chain management practices in Brazil and worldwide. In 2021, the Forum will take place between the 4th and 6th of October in a 100% digital format and will have among its thematic verticals Technology and Digital Transformation, Risks and Sustainability in the Supply Chain, Innovations in E-commerce and Retail, among other topics that are at the top of the agenda of the sector's great executives. Learn more about the Forum and guarantee your registration now here.
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Fernanda Monteiro
More than 11 years of experience in training and consultancy projects, focusing on Logistics and Supply Chain. In consultancy, he carried out projects such as Transformational Logistics Plan, Diagnosis of logistics operations, Strategy and Calendarization of Transport Operations, Measuring the Cost of Serving, Market Study, Mapping of Inventory Reduction Opportunities, Review of the S&OP Process, Management Plan Training and Implementation of Commercial Processes in companies such as Nestlé, Raia Drogasil, Ipiranga, Lojas Americanas, B2W, Coca-Cola, Andina, Embraco, Martins Atacado, Loja do Mecânico, Santo Antônio Energia, Ecoporto and Silimed. She is currently one of the teachers of the Inventory Management Course taught every six months by ILOS. She worked on the development and management of Online Courses in Logistics and Supply Chain, Supply Processes, Demand Planning, Inventory Management and Industrial Management. Still in the training area, she was responsible for applying ILOS business games in companies such as Raia Drogasil, Fibria, NEC, Novartis and Moove.
