Fulfilling a brand’s promise to customers in 2021 and beyond will demand more efficient and transparent logistics orchestration across carriers, 3PLs, forwarders, multiple modes, and geographies. Both freight capacity and freight costs will remain volatile for some time in varying modes and geographies due to pandemic effects and responses.
Rapid innovation and experimentation continue in final-mile/last-mile operations as businesses seek to serve customers profitably when e-commerce displaces traditional distribution networks. Logistics organizations are asked to adapt continually, improving their ability to sense friction anywhere along the supply chain and swiftly respond with course corrections.
To increase options for the last mile, global transportation teams responsible for the first mile have a new imperative beyond cost reduction: Prioritize product movement around the world to prevent lost sales, protect market share, and seize sales growth opportunities. Businesses must protect their end customers’ experience, beginning with how they manage orders at origin and throughout product journeys that cross oceans and borders.
The pressure to contain and reverse freight spend increases will return when markets and global economies settle into more stable patterns, but it will be tempered with awareness of the value of cost optimization in support of business success, instead of siloed cost reduction.
Infor Nexus sees businesses with complex global supply chains investing strongly in digital technologies and services to support international logistics execution, tracking, planning, collaboration, and freight spend management. Over-reliance on manual processes and spreadsheets was exposed as a critical weakness in worldwide supply chains during 2020.
We’ve observed growing market interest in 4PL services. Shippers find multi-enterprise business network technology platforms can power their evolving 4PL strategies with increased benefits and maximum flexibility as they balance logistics outsourcing with direct control. Network platforms streamline connectivity and process workflows in global supply chain ecosystems, assuring end-to-end visibility of critical participant activities.