SCDigest editorial staff

The News: The MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics announced this week it was launching a new initiative focused on research and insight into “demand management” best practice and strategies.

The Impact: The project taps into an area where there has not been a comprehensive body of research, offering companies an opportunity to participate with others to improve their knowledge and practice.

The Story:  The MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics announced the new demand management project this week, in a sense as an offshoot of the “Supply Chain 2020” project that it has been leading for the past few years.

The current project, like the Supply Chain 2020 project, will be headed by Dr. Larry Lapide, a well-respected supply chain researcher who joined MIT in 2004 to lead the 2020 effort.

“The demand management project was developed in part based on the insight we’ve gained from Supply Chain 2020, showing the need for more detailed research in this area” said Ken Cottrill, editor of MIT’s Supply Chain Strategies newsletter.

According to Cottrill, the project will look at the full spectrum of issues and horizons related to demand management, based on the following initial orientation:

• Longer term strategies: e.g., Setting customer service policies, segmentation strategies and the level of service and collaboration between the company and its suppliers and customers
• Medium term strategies: e.g., Making Sales and Operations Planning (S&OP) work effectively
• Shorter term strategies: e.g., Inventory management, redirecting goods based on real-time demand, etc.
• Information strategies: e.g., Information/data required to achieve world class demand management strategy and execution, such as demand and supply visibility, customer and product profitability, etc.

“Our plan is to organize a continuing research group to study the demand management practices and challenges of different kinds of industries in order to understand the underlying principles that influence them and to create advanced strategies by which they can optimally manage supply and demand over time,” Lapide explained. The payback for companies could be huge: increased profitability, more market share and improved customer service.

The project is launching with a roundtable conference next week in Chicago that will include a number of end users and software and service providers to discuss the opportunities for greater insight into demand management excellence.

Cost to participate directly in the project, which will provide participants with a number of benefits, is being currently being determined.

Do you think this Demand Management project is addressing an area in need of more research and insight? Let us know your thoughts.