Supplier Finance: startling features and benefits from a burgeoning sector

A vital and positive consequence of Supplier Finance is the transformation of production, distribution and delivery infrastructure. New initiatives to break away from outdated supply chain practices continue to spring up week on week, with the latest big-ticket partnerships between financial institutions and manufacturers in Japan and Canada.

So what do we stand to gain, and what innovations have the modern supply chain masters invested in to derive these benefits? A cursory examination of the world’s best supply chains has unearthed some startling features and benefits:

• inventory-taking drones
• location intelligence – item-level RFID (radio frequency identification)
• real-time data derived from the ‘Internet of Things’
• starting processes with a customer-centric mindset
• predictive analytics
• A major US pharmaceutical company has gone as far as setting up a “Supply Chain Innovation Engine Lab” involving partners and subject matter experts to optimise performance
• utilising big data for a multitude of processes

Notable benefits of cutting-edge logistical / blockchain delivery

• incredible scale – in 2019 a notable Chinese e-tailer with an incredible supply chain infrastructure managed to deliver 1.3billion items on the country’s ‘Singles Day’ – the most significant sales event of the year
• greatly reduced to-market times
• significantly increased fraud prevention
• rapid order satisfaction times – one French cosmetics firm receives and processes an order every two seconds, annually satisfying demand for seven billion products from its 150 distribution centres
• greater resilience (one prominent US IT firm secured a 19% increase in sales despite the pandemic) – and landed them due to their logistic wizardry
• achievable ‘zero waste’ targets
• product traceability ensures all suppliers and manufacturers in chain satisfy the company’s corporate social responsibility and sustainability standards
• significant positive in-house sustainability outcomes – i.e. one US company has returned 80% of its water supply back to community use
• democratises funding decisions, makes smaller businesses more visible and increasingly eligible for funding
• offer customized products throughout multiple distribution channels
• improve safety for warehousing staff

Following recent exciting developments Zvilo is on the cusp of entering this sector – to join the movement striving to bring trade in the Balkans into the twenty-first century, while providing equitable returns for all stakeholders involved

We have a very specific plan and more will be revealed soon – watch this space…