There’s no doubt about it – supply chain plays a critical role in allowing organizations to innovate, increase profitability, and be more competitive. But, as businesses and government expand their global reach and diversify their products and services, supply chains become more complex. This evolution can result in your supply chain becoming the weakest link when it comes to security. With threats ranging from physical to cybersecurity concerns, it’s essential that you manage all types of security risks associated with the supply chain ecosystem.
The first step toward a secure supply chain starts with planning ahead. This may sound easy, but there are countless challenges in securing supply chain planning and execution. Some of the biggest challenges may sound familiar:
- Insufficient data analytics and reporting tools
- Fragmented systems with multiple information silos
- Planning and execution gaps
- Multi-faceted data models
- Lack of customer centricity
Feeling uncertain yet? You’re not alone.
Uncertainty is the new norm when navigating supply chain security. This feeling can intensify when you throw migrating your operations to the cloud into the mix. There are also additional security complexities and compliance requirements to consider. Bottom line, what originally sounded easy can quickly turn into a lengthy, expensive, and possibly difficult endeavor.
Don’t worry, there’s hope. You can make strides by breaking down the supply chain process into distinct steps: 1) planning, 2) buying, 3) making 4) moving and 5) delivering supplies. Since the first step in any endeavor is the most important, you’ll start strong by setting up a solid plan.
To help plan for a secure supply chain, it’s recommended to start with a platform that can provide end-to-end insight across your organization, such as an integrated business planning solution. Integrated Business Planning (IBP) can help organizations take the next step forward. It helps overcome key challenges in the supply chain and planning processes.
Through IBP, enterprises gain a single holistic plan that unifies the business, seamlessly connecting corporate performance management, financial planning processes, and operational planning systems. This comprehensive plan increases business alignment through the sharing of performance strategies and helps quantify business risks so enterprises can rapidly adapt to meet challenges.
There is More Security in the Cloud
Governance and compliance issues around data residency, sovereignty, and security are extensive and complex. In response, some organizations have tried to build their own supply-chain control towers on-premises, which often results in years of development and runaway costs. IBP helps you avoid the steep cost curve.
IBP meets the toughest compliance requirements such as International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). This means that leaders can now use the industry’s strongest supply chain modeling in a collaborative tool to support tactical and operational planning without their data ever leaving the walls of the United States. IBP utilizes AWS GovCloud infrastructure which is certified FedRAMP® High, and DoD IL 4/5. The customer can get the right material to the right place, at the right time, in the right amount whether it’s for defense, disaster management, logistical support, or manufacturing.
Why You Need Security Now, More than Ever
Securing your supply chain is imperative, and the aforementioned are just a few of concerns that can complicate the process. As technology evolves, it’s clear that a prudent security approach needs to be multi-faceted and can provide defense against a huge range of physical and virtual threats. IBP doesn’t make it happen overnight, but it does help simply the process.
To learn more about mastering the other stages in the secure supply chain process, sign up for our secure cloud series.
