Vikash Khatri Founder and CEO

vika sh kha tri

What do you feel are the biggest challenges companies in the supply chain space face and how is risk monitored and overcome? Currently, the vulnerability of supply chains along with the unavailability of manpower is the biggest challenge the industry is facing. The historical time series analysis of movement and inventory is no longer valid; the ability of supply chains to consume internal and hyper local data on a real-time basis has accelerated. Traditionally, all supply chains were designed for cost efficiency, but in the new normal, this objective is being superseded with the KPI of ser viceability. The supremacy of planning function is now being challenged with the function of supply chain visibility/ control tower to monitor the risk and take real-time tactical decisions.

Even if we exclude the unforeseen circumstances due to COVID, there are some perpetual challenges for supply chain functions.

One of biggest challenge has been to create a balance between lowest possible cost and flexibility of capacity as per demand variation. On one side of the supply chain, increasing expectations of customers is posing challenge.

Another challenge is the lack of tal ent. Challenges of talent exist on white collar and blue collar.

Besides, poor level of standardisation across the supply chain is also a challenge, leading to inefficiency, rigidity, weak por tability, and ultimately increased cost.

As a consultancy, there is a high value placed on empowering companies to make better decisions, how impor tant is keeping up with the latest trends to ensure you are delivering exactly what your customers need? Supply chain consulting requires the ability to assimilate and operate in ei ther presence or absence of specific data sets. A multivariate optimisation prob lem is both a design as well as a computational challenge.

Consulting today has undergone transformation; it has moved away from

COVID-19 has exposed the vulnerabilities of complex global supply chains built on lean manufacturing principles. The impact of China’s lockdown and its dominance in key areas of manufacturing further highlighted the problem with modern supply chains. Vikash Khatr i, Fo under and CEO, Av iral Consult ing, in a brief conversation with Upamanyu Borah, elaborates the transition to a new model for supply chains which will be underpinned by a decentralisation of manufacturing capacity and wholesale digitisation of the paperwork that accompanies global trade.

We would see a movement towards localisation

just advisory services based on past knowledge from engagements with cli ents. Today, most clients expect the advisor to be part of the journey and hence looking for recommendations to be ex ecuted for them. In such a scenario, we need to remain domain focussed and connected with the industry to keep on updating our knowledge base. However, the satisfaction of daily execution and results is what drives this niche practice of consulting across our clients.

In order to assess inefficiencies of logistics in any organisation, what practices or tools are available? In order to assess and optimise inefficiencies, there are multiple simulationbased tools but none provide one stop holistic assessment of logistics efficiency.

At Aviral, we have introduced ‘Logis tics Audit’- a comprehensive audit of processes, practices, and network. The objective is to examine competitiveness and robustness of logistics operations, effi ciency and cost. Optimisation is the next step to it. This activity also provides rec ommendations and guidelines on logistics management to improve overall efficiency. As industries restart with constrained liquidity and cost pressures, how can organisations drive initia tives to cut supply chain complexity?

In the past few months, we have witnessed a change in demand patterns, challenges in maintaining supplies, liquidity, and pressure of cost optimisation. Across the world, supply chains have connected source of lowest cost manufacturing to the centers of consumption.

The crisis has exposed the risks and vulnerabilities of the cross-border sup ply chain with single-source dependence, which is now expected to realign. As we redesign/redirect the global sup ply chain, we would see a movement towards localisation, distributed manu facturing, and the cross-border supply chain problem will morph into smaller localised problems like links in a chain.

What do you envision for the future of the Indian supply chain industry to look like? Maturity of supply chain industry depends on infrastructure, technology and volumes to support sustainability. Al most all the indications on these parameters are favourable for India. With rapid investments by the government in rail freight corridors, airports, express ways, and adoption of more digitalisation, the future for supply chain industry is very bright. Additionally, there will be manifold opportunities in the market with the shifting of global sup ply chains from China.