Trend vision Rhenus Logistics: Continuity at the top of the agenda

How can you maintain your service to customers in times of supply chain disruption? Continuity-related issues are currently high on the agenda for businesses and have resulted in several shifts in supply chain strategy, such as towards sourcing materials closer to home, i.e. from within Europe rather than Asia.

“There is a clear difference between the pre- and post-coronavirus period,” says Alphons van Erven, Senior Vice President at Rhenus Contract Logistics. “Continuity is now undoubtedly at the top of the list of priorities for all our clients. They want to be able to maintain their service to customers, no matter what else is going on in the wider world – and that’s why they come to us. It all started earlier this year when deliveries from Asia were disrupted. That caused problems for a number of businesses. The trend we’re now seeing is that various companies are looking at doing more local sourcing, by which I mean sourcing from within or just outside of Europe. Those new shifts also offer opportunities, such as to further grow the European activities rather than expanding the Asian ones.”

Onboarding tool

Markus Simons, Finance Director at Rhenus Contract Logistics, adds: “In relation to this, another clear trend is that our customers are becoming increasingly ‘data driven’. They are keen to make much better use of the available data for forecasting purposes. As a logistics service provider we have access to large volumes of data too, and we can use predictive analysis to add value for our customers. Besides that, we’re rolling out a data mining tool which allows that data to be used to get a very clear view of all the activities. Together with your customers, this enables you to hugely improve the efficiency because you can identify the best action for particular types of orders.”