SONIC MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGIES
How Does It Work ? Let ’ s imagine that you want to build a single car . At this point , you need one engine , two doors , and four tyres . Your materials requirements planning engine ( MRP ) says that you have one tire in stock and need to buy three more . Instead of having a buyer make inquiries , you can send over an API request for price and availability . How many do you have in stock ? What are the price points for one , a hundred , or a thousand ? What ’ s the lead time to get more ? By doing so , your automated system can confirm price and availability in advance of issuing a purchase order .
The current market conditions of shortages and allocations in the semiconductor industry turned out to be the perfect fit for such a solution . ‘ You have extended lead times and minimal inventories ,’ David explains . ‘ Nothing moves better through this market than a digital supply chain .’ Machines can source and order scarce parts from suppliers much faster than humans . ‘ You have a computer running 24 hours a day ,’ David says , ‘ while your competitors check in once or twice a day during business hours .’ For COVID-19-induced constraints , automation wins the race .
Rather than reducing labour , in fact , digital supply chains repurpose labour to focus on what ’ s important . For example , in electronics supply chains , that ’ s often those last , critical parts needed to finish the product . ‘ If I bring 99 out of a hundred parts for the product into the building ,’ David says , ‘ the clock starts to tick . I have to pay someone . I have to tie up the stockroom space . So it ’ s kind of pointless to brag about half my deliveries arriving in three days if the last part comes in three months . Because only when that last part arrives can I build , ship , and invoice . APIs take people off of routine repetitive ordering and give them time and circumstance to become exception managers and problem solvers . Job satisfaction improves , performance improves .’
The Benefits Efficient When it comes to the benefits of a digital supply chain , the most obvious one is that neither party has to perform the dreaded data entry . If you have a 10-line purchase order , for example , your buyer has to type in all 10 entries . They ’ d then send it to a supplier who would repeat the process . ‘ As soon as you go digital and have your computer buy from their computer ,’ David says , ‘ there ’ s a true win-win . Your people can now focus on exceptions rather than the “ we ’ ve got to get a thousand parts on order ” grunt work .’ supplychaindigital . com 109