Intelligent Planning & Execution

Trade spend happens to be the second-largest line item in the CPG P&L today, representing almost 17-25% of the gross revenue. But the greater concern for most CPG’s lies in the fact that – over the last 5 years, the rate of growth of trade spend has far outpaced the corresponding sales growth!

Misalignment between trade planning & retail execution is often the primary reason behind this phenomenon. Significant part of the market opportunities identified as part of the trade planning process go unrealized because of this glaring misalignment.
Following are some of the key reasons why this tends to happen:

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Recognizing the gravity of this trade marketing problem, we at ITC Infotech have evolved a robust “intelligent planning and execution” framework along with our platform partners. This capability aims to seamlessly integrate trade planning with retail execution and bolster it further by providing in-line contextual insight into the front-line workers, enabling an aligned and flawless execution of their trade strategy.

 

Field Force Enablement

To improve sales, CPG companies need to empower their field force with real-time data, enabling critical decision making. ITC Infotech’s enterprise-class mobility framework resolves a range of such business challenges by pulling data from across the value chain. The solution results in the efficient management of daily activities such as direct store delivery (DSD), CRM, and route accounting.
Our solution facilitates streamlining trade marketing functions (sales processing, inventory control, tracking customer interactions, surveys, audits, and sales force analysis) reducing/ eliminating misplaced sales orders, delayed delivery, mismatch in cash collection, reconciliation problems, execution of trade promotions, poor quality of data captured and inconsistencies. A separate module works to manage distributors’ activities and trade marketing leveraging automation.

Differentiators:

• Real-time information for improved decision making
• Execution Insight
• Enhanced customer service
• Easy integration and interface with existing enterprise applications
• Reduced risks of error-prone manual data entry
• Increased operational visibility
• Personnel capacity and fleet optimization
• Better customer service
• Increased ROI
• Easy to use interface leading to increased adoption by the field force
• Localization enablement

 

Integrated Trade Promotion Management

CPGs partner with ITC Infotech to enhance the efficiency of their trade promotion initiatives by leverage our sophisticated analytics.

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The solution creates a collaborative environment for product development teams focused on new features and enhancements in TPM, budgeting, promotion planning and execution, approval and exception handling, monitoring and reporting, settlement and trade promotion evaluation.

Differentiators:

• In-depth understanding of TPM customers to provide them with complete flexibility on pricing, deployment models and to help maintain their upgrades and updates better
• Private cloud hosting to reduce capex
• SaaS implementation for zero up-front license cost
• Optimizing promo spends
• Improved promotion effectiveness
• Holistic planning and execution management
• Easy financial management such as spend, accruals, and claims
• Reduced costs and OOS instances with superior forecasting accuracy
• Fund allocation optimization
• Promo calendar optimization

 

New Product Innovation and Development

CPGs need to keep on innovating and develop new products as the consumer requirements change. CPGs also struggle to keep the wallet share, mindshare, shelf space, and need an accelerated product innovation and development. We work with global CPG companies’ to effectively use technology frameworks to accelerate new product development, optimize R&D budgets, improve quality and comply with regulations.

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We achieve this by plugging into the strategic pull and mapping projects with business initiatives to strengthen the organizational commitment in delivering new products and solutions. Through program management that drives the integration of key function and ensures our customers deliver quality products on time; going beyond primary and secondary linkages to cover tertiary linkages and dependencies to avoid delays in the launch of new products; and through a learn-improve-learn execution cycle that incorporates incremental learnings into product development. Depending on the customer’s preferences, we deploy either structured tools for ‘lean product development’ or short ‘post-implementation reviews’ for new products.

Differentiators:

• Robust and sustainable new product development process
• Meeting customer expectations for new product development processes and functions

Retail CPG Collaboration

To meet consumer expectations of getting the right product using the right channel demands a shelf-centered collaboration at a strategic business planning level between CPG firms and retailers. We work with CPG clients to build their collaboration capabilities with retailers. Our solutions include:

• Category Management for product positioning, category-based demand forecasting, and new product identification
• Campaign Management for planning promotional activities, targeting relevant segments and analyzing promotional performance
• Inventory Management for replenishment planning, scheduling, and managing workforce
• Assortment Planning for localized assortment and shelf space optimization
• Supply Chain Management for reduced OOS and SKU optimization
• Demand Management for developing baseline forecast, measuring accuracy of forecast and ensuring product replenishment
• Customer and Market Analytics for identifying market segments and providing shopper insights
• Master Data Management for defining product items, attributes and introducing newer products without the risk of cannibalization

Differentiators:

• Superior product development
• Data insights for informed decision making
• Enhanced planning and innovation
• Increased accuracy in forecasting
• Increased responsiveness to opportunities
• Timely stock replenishment
• Efficient consumer response
• Enhanced transparency in business processes

Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP)

CPGs have been facing challenges related to the accuracy of demand forecasting, demand-supply gaps, lack of planning views in demand management, inventory build-up, lost sales, and non-optimal production capacity in supply management. We work with leading CPGs for effective S&OP based on consensus-based demand plans created using enterprise data and logic-based supply-production planning. We transform the planning ecosystem of organizations from being inward-looking and hierarchy-centric to being outward-looking and customer-centric.

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Our solutions aim to balance supply and demand (using our S&OP process framework) and keep budget allocations on track. We do this using a proven methodology that seeks commitments from top management, followed by process implementation, a performance tracking framework, and a stringent governance model backed by technology enablers and cutting-edge tools.

Differentiators:

• Scientific approach to balancing demand and supply
• Budget allocations kept on track
• Requirements for technology improvements identified
• Promotion and sustenance of continuous improvement culture

 

Strategic Supply Chain Network Design

Persistent challenges in maintaining market share and leadership have prompted CPG companies to choose unique network configurations to optimize their supply chain – one that offers the lowest total cost of ownership provides sourcing information, delivers intelligent analysis, and maximizes profits by considering financial and operational risks. CPG majors leverage our Strategic Network Design to execute operational sustainability, bring in cost-effectiveness, and create business alignment. ITC Infotech applies intelligence to strategic network design, improving the customer’s financial performance through increased revenues, reduced costs, and enhanced flexibility to respond to market dynamics.

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Our solution addresses and improves:

• Resource acquisition and divestment covering

  • Decisions on facility opening and closing
  • Product portfolio decisions
  • Capacity augmentation vs outsourcing decision
  • High-level trade-off decisions
  • Automation uptake and forgo

• Operating policies for

  • Prebuild strategy
  • Inventory versus service trade-off
  • Warehouse booking plan
  • Capacity realignment
  • Postponement strategy
  • Production SKU mix decision
  • Raw Materials and Finished Goods (RM &FG) sourcing network

• Structural decisions related to

  • Defining roles of various facilities
  • Market planning
  • Product promotion planning
  • Transportation mode selection
  • Network structure

• Operational efficiency for

  • Rough-cut-capacity-planning (RCCP) and firm distribution network
  • Shipment sizing and scheduling
  • Load optimization
  • Route planning
  • Contract labor optimization
  • Safety stock and cycle stock optimization
  • Simulation and low-level sensitivity analysis

Differentiators:

ITC Infotech has developed a unique ‘SAVE’ methodology for its clients:

• Sourcing Information: Understanding the client’s unique business requirements and strategy, gaining competitive and value chain framework insights, mapping existing operations strategy and identifying key stakeholders to map readiness for change
• Analysis: Classifying KPIs, benchmarking success factors, checking effect of distribution network redesign on other business processes, developing high-level model framework, time estimation and critical data collation
• Validation: Building baselines and optimized models, performing cross alternative sensitivity analysis to arrive at final scenario, creating business process impact metrics, implementation road map, final KPIs and redesign process flows
• Execution: Execute changes as per road map, run simulations to generate performance metrics, implement user training, and run awareness programs followed by monitoring adoption and success factors continuously to ascertain solution effectiveness

Digital Supply Chain Command Centre

For supply chains to transform from a support function to play a critical role in the organization’s overall profitability, planning, and operations they will need to be powered by robust data management and intelligent analytics. CPGs partner with us to acquire these capabilities. They leverage our automation solutions to amplify and improve their everyday supply chain processes around data and performance management for demand planning, supply planning, and inventory management.

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The solution addresses and improves:

• Data Management

  • Demand Planning – Portfolio rationalization, material masters as per the planning note and new product/customer master
  • Supply Planning – Location, network, product interchangeability masters as per planning note and deployment/TLB masters
  • Inventory Management – Maintaining the latest inventory norms for location-based products

• Analysis and Process Support

  • Demand Planning – Monthly planning note analysis, suggesting the correct model generate a forecast, creating estimation template for S&OP and uploading and validating it
  • Supply Planning – System heuristics data analytics, system planning masters review, shipment and order management, root cause analysis and issue resolution
  • Inventory Management – Stock flow analysis, monitoring and control, aging stock analysis, order processing, issue resolution, and exception management

• Performance Management

  • Demand Planning – Pre-upload checks on forecast accuracy and fidelity, managing exceptions for estimation process, forecast KPI tracking, and reporting and analysis for S&OP
  • Supply Planning – Creating fill-rate and out of stock reports and performing a root cause analysis, production adherence tracking, shipment performance tracking, and reporting and analysis for S&OP
  • Inventory Management – Actual inventory versus norms analysis, tracking and reporting for customers, norm versus pipeline analysis at different nodes for S&OP

Differentiators:

• Increase efficiencies by identifying need-gaps in supply chain planning and operations
• Cost optimization through process centralization
• Better control through standardization and automation
• Aligning multiple complex processes to integrate operations
• Influencing faster business decision-making

 

Connected Manufacturing