In an increasingly complex world, AI can produce analyses and projections fine enough to support organizations in their quest for agility. Back to the basics of the technology and its benefits for the supply chain.

Sales forecasting, inventory management, planning, scheduling... How to anticipate the vital functions of the supply chain in an unstable environment and in the face of demand that is becoming volatile? The answers include artificial intelligence and its most well-known branches, machine learning and deep learning. But how do they work? What use cases can be identified? And which companies exist on the market to serve these needs? To answer these vast questions, four experts from the sector took turns on September 30 during a webinar organized jointly by the Lab Digital de France Supply Chain and Wavestone.

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Demystifying artificial intelligence
and understand the data

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From exploration to exploitation
of AI for the Supply Chain

From a practical point of view, these AI algorithms have a positive impact on supply chain management: on data, demand forecasts, sales strategy, but also on stock replenishment, supervision and forecasting. Ivan Baturone, Michelin's Supply Chain Innovation Manager, gave a concrete presentation on the development of SAAM (Stock Analysis & Alerting Machine), a tool that "deals with the tsunami of supply chain data for the distribution of our products from our factories to our commercial warehouses. We have developed machine learning algorithms to help us detect three weeks before an item is out of stock at a distribution point. Ultimately, the Holy Grail would be to achieve a self-analysing and self-regulating supply chain. Thus, over 2019, thanks to SAAM, Michelin has notably increased its "product" availability by 7 points.

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A radar, a panorama and exchanges
around AI applied to the Supply Chain

Different entries to facilitate the search

A common reading grid to facilitate comparison

Because the Supply Chain is changing, the ASLOG is changing and becoming France Supply Chain by Aslog. Simple words but accurately representing the mission that the association has been carrying for nearly 50 years now: representing the Supply Chain, the vital force of transformation, and those who make it.

From the top of the 19th floor of the SAP tower in Levallois-Perret (92), Fabrice Lundy, economic columnist, three members of the ASLOG management committee - Yann de Feraudy, its Chairman, Stéphanie Rott, Production and Supply Chain Director of the LVMH Group, and Pierre Martin Huet, Group Supply Chain Director of Michelin - are meeting for an unprecedented exchange: Supply Chain Day.

The date is September 10, 2020. The world has been experiencing an unprecedented crisis for several months. Having entered into a "VUCA world (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity)", as Yann de Feraudy reminds us, companies are experiencing multiple uncertainties, at once geopolitical, strategic and climatic, pushing them to make fair and efficient decisions.

"The crisis acts as a revealer. The Supply Chain, by its transversal nature, interacts with all the other activities of the company and is therefore able to implement collaboration and alignment of objectives.Inthis sense, it is a lever for a sustainable world"
demonstrates Stéphanie Rott.

Thus, in this new environment, the Supply Chain and those who make it have shown their importance. After several months of reflection and concrete actions, the time has come for transformation. A profound transformation on the part of the companies but also an intrinsic change for the association: a new name, symbolising its rise to prominence and the pursuit of its ambitions for the sector.

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From ASLOG to France Supply Chain

"This name better says who we are, reminds us of our brand, this old lady who is well known, and wears our colours loud and clear", Yann de Feraudy proudly states. These new name and logo are intended to symbolize a meaningful evolution, described as "volcanic" by Pierre-Martin Huet, but which will not fundamentally change the organization of the association: "We will make new things out of old things, keep a winning team and continue our efforts in the same directions. The strength of France Supply Chain will remain the exchange of experience, best practices and the search for solutions", says Yann de Feraudy.

Concerning the Intralogistics LAB, Laurent Sabatucci, associate director of EOL, talks about visits and theoretical work to keep an eye on all the technologies deployed in the warehouse. Finally, Pierre-Martin Huet, spokesperson for the Sustainable LAB "SupplyChain4Good" insists on the importance of "collective intelligence to implement a sustainable Supply Chain. For example, we bring several shippers and logistics service providers around the table with the idea of decarbonising a freight line all together. Another example, during the Covid-19 crisis, the decision was taken to put certain Supply Chains in difficulty, such as the Restos du cœur, back into motion... We are therefore in the real world, not in a pious hope," he emphasizes.

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Developing, exchanging and raising awareness on sustainable supply chain issues

And it is precisely with a concern for practicality that France Supply Chain wished to reaffirm its missions and priorities for the years to come. There are three of them, and they are illustrated by a desire to raise awareness of the strategic and vital aspect of Supply Chain - "You have to be present on management committees and influence with trainers and public authorities", Yann de Feraudy explains; to make the sector progress but also to make its concepts evolve.

"France Supply Chain is a forum where we learn from each other. Our deep conviction lies in performance for a more sustainable world in an end-to-end logic, from our suppliers' suppliers to our customers' customers' customers. »

And this conviction infuses the heart of organizations and companies. As proof of this, Gerald Karsenti himself, president of SAP, came to announce the forthcoming entry of the publisher into the association. Because as Supply Chain is becoming more visible, the France Supply Chain network is growing, already federating 450 companies of all sizes (large groups, ETIs and SMEs) and from all sectors of activity. " For the future, we intend to maintain our energy, channel it through our LABs and continue to move forward on this Supply Chain route as a lever for transformation towards a more sustainable world", continues the Chairman of France Supply Chain. " Learning faster and together, this is the purpose of France Supply Chain", concludes Stéphanie Rott.

The result of a collaboration between EOL, a specialist in commercial real estate and France Supply Chain by Aslog, the leading French network of Supply Chain professionals, the Intralogistics white paper is aimed at all professionals looking for mechanized, robotized and automated logistics solutions.

AN OVERVIEW OF MECHANIZED AND ROBOTIZED LOGISTICS SOLUTIONS IN LOGISTICS WAREHOUSES

This guide is based on 5 axes:

• The state of the art in intralogistics;
• The challenges and limits of mechanization and robotization;
• Foresight in the field;
• The key success factors for a successful intralogistics project;
• The impact of intralogistics on warehouses.

"THE LEVELS OF COMPLEXITY OF LOGISTICS OPERATIONS, COMBINED WITH OMNICHANNEL SALES ORGANISATIONS, HAVE A VERY STRONG IMPACT ON THE PROFITABILITY OF COMPANIES, FORCING THEM TO RETHINK THEIR LOGISTICS ORGANISATIONS AND PROCESSES IN DEPTH. YANN DE FERAUDY, PRESIDENT OF FRANCE SUPPLY CHAIN.

THE INTRALOGISTICS GUIDE IS RESERVED FOR OUR MEMBERS ONLY.

On July¹, the ASLOG held a webinar to launch a major initiative to bring a new vision of the supply chain to a more resilient, collaborative, close, agile and sustainable world. A look back at the foundations of a necessary and ambitious project.

"For many, the crisis has been a real eye-opener, those who were doing less well are doing worse, those who were doing well are doing even better, just like digital commerce has really exploded," says Yann de Feraudy, President of ASLOG and Deputy CEO Operations & IT of Groupe Rocher. Thus, if the Covid-19 health crisis has highlighted the strengths and weaknesses of organizations, it has also and above all revealed the essential nature of the supply chain. This is an opportunity that ASLOG and its members want to exploit today in order to lead companies towards greater resilience, collaboration, agility, proximity and sustainability. In concrete terms, this webinar is therefore an opportunity to initiate the process of transformation and change for a better world, in which it will be accompanied in particular by the company Imfusio, an expert in transformation.

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Sustainable performance at the heart of the supply chain of the future

Through fundamental questioning, ASLOG and its members intend to play on the four levers of sustainable performance: service, cash, costs and CSR. "The balance between service, costs and cash depends on the type of business the company operates. And even depending on the customers or products served, different balances and supply chain models will be sought. At Michelin, sustainability is at the center of this performance triangle," said Pierre-Martin Huet, Michelin's VP Global Supply Chain and a member of the ASLOG comex. "At LVMH, we position the supply chain as a lever for sustainable performance, in the economic, environmental and social sense of the term. At LVMH, we position supply chain as a lever for sustainable performance in the economic, environmental and social sense of the term. We therefore measure all the challenges of the supply chain as an organization in charge of helping to make the decisions underlying business management," adds Stéphanie Rott, LVMH's production and supply chain director and also a member of the ASLOG committee.

Based on this premise, how do the ASLOG and its members intend to act and co-construct this common vision for tomorrow? " We have defined five core beliefs: the customer, resilience, collaboration, talent and positive impact at the heart of environmental and societal impact strategies," explains Pierre-Martin Huet. "Diversity within groups is key. Through the principle of collective intelligence, different points of view, angles and horizons, we will achieve a most relevant vision," says Audrey Saget of Imfusio.

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From vision to action

In concrete terms, the ASLOG has been putting its words into action since the beginning of the summer. Following the launch webinar, four days of workshops were held at the beginning of July, and at the end of August, two more days of reflection were held. "We do not claim to hold the absolute truth, but we want to bring out recommendations, driven by five factors: concern for the common good; values of transparency and collaboration; the will to act; the desire to stimulate debate; and subsidiarity. All of the avenues explored will then be taken up in our various labs," explains Yann de Feraudy.

On September 10, ASLOG will then address its stakeholders, public authorities and spheres of influence to share the fruits of its collective work. Once consolidated at the end of 2020, the project will be put into action as early as 2021, on the occasion of the ASLOG Congress. At the same time, the association is considering working, through its international body, with other European organizations. The objective is to take this approach beyond our borders and turn it into a project that is as global as it is sustainable.

SUPPLY CHAIN TRANSFORMATION - ISSUES - PRIORITIES - HUMAN RESOURCES RESOURCES

The Logistics and Transport sectors represent 10% of the French GDP and around 10% of jobs in the commercial sector. If we consider our Supply Chain universes, we are talking about more than 2 million jobs with a strong growth potential over the next few years. Based on this observation, France Supply Chain by Aslog conducted a survey among its members during the summer of 2019 to understand and grasp the challenges of human resources management for Supply Chain and Logistics.

The survey is based on 3 main themes:

On June 18, the ASLOG/FRANCE SUPPLY CHAIN organized its first webinar after the deconfinement. On this occasion, the association's HR Lab once again stressed the importance of the men and women who have acted to ensure the continuity of economic activity in France.

Moderated by Philippe Raynaud, VP Supply Chain Europe Asia Pacific at BIC, in charge of the HR Lab and a member of the ASLOG/FRANCE SUPPLY CHAIN Executive Committee, the webinar was designed to share in a qualitative and privileged way the feedback from teams that have been working together during the crisis. The first testimonial was from the luxury brand Louis Vuitton, through the voice of Stéphane Fallon, Logistics Director: "During this period, we were able to rely on important prerequisites: a good social climate and a relationship of trust throughout the chain of command. Our employees needed to feel listened to and, paradoxically, to have a manager capable of guiding and reassuring them," he continues. To do this, the group acted quickly. From February 24, a crisis unit was formed and debriefed every morning. " Our management and our teams have enabled us to keep our warehouses safe," explains Didier Renard, Warehouse and E-commerce Manager Europe at Louis Vuitton.

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From service providers to partners

Another case in point, in the Oise region, at the heart of one of Covid-19's first clusters, is the collaboration between a client, Pierre de Saint Victor, Supply Services Director France & Benelux within the consumer goods group Reckitt Benckiser and its logistics provider, Vincent Derebergue, Director of the FM Logistic platform in Crépy-en-Valois: "We experienced the crisis about 15 days before everyone else in Crépy-en-Valois, but despite everything, our entire management team was there and our employees showed great resilience. The whole site understood the role it had to play," says Vincent Derebergue. For the teams at FM Logistic and RB, the result was a change in the way they work together, with transparency and trust. "We've gone from being a service provider to a partner," says Derebergue. Pierre de Saint Victor confirms this: "We have emerged from this crisis stronger in the concept of responsible collaboration.

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Making the link

Finally, Alexandre Berger, Business Unit Director - Logistics Solutions and Local Transport at La Poste Group, explained how the Group has managed to develop new services for citizens around the delivery of meals, shopping and medicines at home: "The fact that La Poste has been designated a vital interest organisation has been a motivation for the employees. This definition of our priorities has generated a real vocation to create new services", he explains. Thus, from this unprecedented experience, Alexandre Berger will retain the notion of "link". A link that the HR Lab of ASLOG/FRANCE SUPPLY CHAIN intends to strengthen by continuing its work through the publication of the panorama of Human Resources in supply chain and the first guide to supply chain higher education in France from the beginning of July.

Some see it as a project, others as a concrete project, and the last as a source of questions. The IoT for Supply Chain has been attracting the interest of the sector for many years. On the occasion of the "Rencontres du Digital", the ASLOG/FRANCE SUPPLY CHAIN and the consulting firm Wavestone returned to the subject through a dedicated webinar.

The crisis will have proved it. Despite its resilience, the supply chain still needs to develop its velocity, i.e. its agility and efficiency, to function optimally despite the disruptions. And to do this, the IoT is proving to be a powerful tool. Marc Dauga and Pierre-Yves Audoy, respectively Partner Supply Chain and Manager Manufacturing at Wavestone, and Francois Martin-Festa, VP Digital Customer Experience at Schneider Electric and Head of the Digital Lab at Aslog/France Supply Chain, led a dedicated webinar on this topic on June 24.

The objective? To share the keys to asking the right questions and making the right choice of dedicated solutions. " Above all, it is essential to start from a business need, to frame it, to feed a precise specification and to know the ecosystem of the players in order to choose the one best suited to your needs," emphasizes Marc Dauga after recalling the main principles of the IoT for supply chain, namely the collection and analysis of data from an IoT object placed on a handling unit (pallets, racks, bins, products).

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Tobetter understand
the technological bricks related to IoT

The three experts are unanimous in their view that conducting an IoT project can be complex. The first difficulty is the growing number of players offering their services. Marc Dauga notes "a 60% growth in five years in the number of start-ups in the sector. ». The second challenge is to understand and get to know the technology, which is evolving very quickly. In addition to continuous technological progress, Marc Dauga identifies 3 major breakthroughs: the 5G network, nano satellite and edge computing. As for the technological building blocks, they can be divided into four:

• The IoT object, its lifespan, its cost, its conditions of use and its collection and storage capacity.
• The network and data transport and the need to think about the distance between the object and the network, the data rate, the energy consumption and the precision objectives of geolocation.

• The IoT platform and its hosting location, its management of the life cycle of dedicated objects, its ability to integrate new types, to manage an increase in the volume of data and the number of APIs it can provide.
• Data application for use cases, i.e. web interface as well as supply chain tools such as TMS, WMS, MES...

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Identify and choose the right partner(s)
to optimize your supply chain with IoT

Once carefully selected and mastered, these bricks give rise to an IoT solution that addresses use cases with a virtuous impact on the transformation of the supply chain. Marc Dauga discusses product tracking (outdoor or indoor), product tracing, but also improving efficiency through inventory management, maintenance or even the piloting of the energy performance of buildings. And to best choose its service providers and partners in the start-up of an IoT project, Wavestone has identified about 50 French start-ups operating in the business, only on the BtoB market, with at least eight years of existence and less than 50 employees. "These elements provide the keys to asking the right questions, to better segment a project according to the 4 major dimensions of the IoT and to draw up a complete panorama of French start-ups on this subject", Francois Martin-Festa concludes.

The Wavestone-France Supply Chain white paper and radar are available on the website

The SupplyChain4Good initiative enables the delivery of 1,650 protective visors and valve connectors for respirators to the Strasbourg IHU.

To combat the Covid19 virus, the Supply Chain is more than ever at the heart of a France that is organising itself in the face of this unprecedented situation. Routing of basic foodstuffs and medical equipment: supply chains are becoming progressively tighter, less reliable and more vulnerable. However, the maintenance, solidity and security for several weeks of these priority supply chains are becoming vital.

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In this context, Movin'On and ASLOG , who are working on sustainable mobility solutions for goods through the SupplyChain4Good community, could not remain inactive. For several weeks now, part of the community has been organising the matching of available logistics capacities with the needs of the actors who are on the front line (hospitals, food distribution and basic necessities...).

In just a few weeks, this solidarity system made it possible to centralize, via a dedicated email, the needs as well as the available capacities. All requests are centralised and a team is in charge of consolidating them and then communicating with the right players.

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It is notably within the framework of this initiative that the #SupplyChain4Good community made it possible, between April 1 and 6, to send 1,650 protective visors printed in 3D to the IHU in Strasbourg.

On March 30, Luckylink, a company working on solidarity initiatives against coronavirus, contacted ASLOG via a dedicated email address(urgences@aslog.fr) to find a partner to ship 3D protective visors to the IHU in Strasbourg.

As part of the SupplyChain4Good initiative, Fabien Esnoult, ASLOG Board Member, SupplyChain4Good Project Coordinator and President of SprintProject, puts him in contact with Ahmed Chaieb, Founder of Box2Home, the solution for express delivery, assembly and installation of bulky products.

Following this connection and between 1st and 6th April, Box2Home collects from the companies Alchimies (Dieuze) and PIM Industrie (Marckolsheim) more than 1650 protective visors and makes the delivery to the IHU of Strasbourg. A detour to the home of a private individual was also organized, in order to recover a donation of valve connectors, intended for respirators, manufactured with his personal 3D printer.

#SupplyChain4Good

The #SupplyChain4Good community was created on the initiative of Michelin and the Aslog, as part of the Movin'On ecosystem, in favor of a more sustainable mobility of goods.

#SupplyChain4Good aims to bring together players working for Supply Chains that are simultaneously good for the planet, people and business performance.

The members of this community are "shippers" (industrial and commercial companies), "operators" (transporters, logisticians, shipping companies, ports...), "support functions" (academics, consultants, information systems, regulators, NGOs...). They cover all economic sectors and all regions of the world. Their work takes place throughout the year and culminates in the annual Movin'On Summit, the world summit on sustainable mobility.

Contribute actively to the project

 #SupplyChain4Good #Covid19

Yann DE FERAUDY	ASLOGPresident
Pierre-Martin HUET	VP Global Supply Chain MICHELIN
Valérie MACREZ	Managing Director ASLOG
Ivan BATURONE	Vice President, Supply Chain Innovation MICHELIN
Fabien ESNOULT	Member of the ASLOG Board of Directors and Chairman of SprintProject
Alain BORRI	Managing Director BP2R
Augustin GUELDRY	Managing Director Colicoach
Frédéric MIREBEAU	President WelcomeTrack
Jérôme LEFORT	Lawyer Partner Law Firm LLC & Associates (Legal Expert)
Frédéric VAGLIO	Chairman Meliora Group (Security Expert)
Benoit AUJAY	Managing Director B2PWeb