Sales and operations planning is designed to allow businesses to cope with change , but has S & OP itself needed to change in such challenging times ?

WRITTEN BY : SEAN ASHCROFT

In short , it ’ s an integrated monthly process that helps businesses manage in the midst of change – and we ’ ve never before experienced such times of change as these past few years .

But is S & OP itself having to change to meet these challenges ?

To help us answer this , and other questions , we turned to Paul Brody ( PB ), Global Blockchain Business Lead at EY , and Mark Levy ( ML ), who is Supply Chain Planning Advisory MD at KPMG .

How is digitalisation changing S & OP ? PB : S & OP has been digital for decades . The opportunities on the horizon aren ' t about going from analogue to digital , but from silos to integration .

Nearly all big companies have digital data , but it ’ s locked in their own operational silos . The way forward on this is , I believe , blockchains .

Blockchain standardises how we represent supply chain assets and also enables visibility to key business partners . For example , a joint initiative with [ blockchain protocol ] Polygon is enabling EY clients to conduct private transactions , and the [ open-source blockchain ] Ethereum Mainnet has been pivotal in this process .

Because we don ’ t re-enter data each time an asset crosses company boundaries , we get

38 December 2022