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Blog Entries by Andrew Atkinson


  • Barriers to supply chain collaboration: Actionable information needed—fast!

    Andrew Atkinson, Director, Product Marketing, E2open - Thursday, April 12, 2012 - 0 Comments
    Andrew Atkinson - Barriers to supply chain collaboration: Actionable information needed—fast!

    What gets in the way of effective collaboration with supply chain partners? The latest research from SCM World’s Kevin O’Marah, Collaborative Execution: Speed, Innovation and Profitability, surveyed 374 supply chain professionals, to identify the top barriers to achieving “truly collaborative” relationships across the extended trading network.  More »

  • What’s really the cheapest shore? Why nearshore, and how do you decide?

    Andrew Atkinson, Director, Product Marketing, E2open - Friday, January 27, 2012 - 0 Comments
    Andrew Atkinson - What’s really the cheapest shore? Why nearshore, and how do you decide?

    In a recent report, Gartner projected that by 2014, "20 percent of Asia-produced and U.S.-consumed goods will be nearshored in the Americas." This nearshoring shift will be part of a more general move from low-cost country sourcing strategies to optimized-cost country strategies. What does this really mean?  More »

  • Thailand floods threaten more than just “business as usual”…Is your supply chain ready?

    Andrew Atkinson, Director, Product Marketing, E2open - Thursday, November 03, 2011 - 0 Comments
    Andrew Atkinson - Thailand floods threaten more than just “business as usual”…Is your supply chain ready?

    As I write this, Bangkok is still under several feet of water and several major Japanese auto manufacturers have had to cease production due to a lack of critical parts sourced from Thailand. Whatever else happens, the one thing you can count on is that there will always be some kind of trouble cropping up to disrupt normal business operations... More »

  • The Open World we live in now

    Andrew Atkinson, Director, Product Marketing, E2open - Thursday, October 06, 2011 - 0 Comments
    Andrew Atkinson - The Open World we live in now

    There is a drumbeat running beneath the glitzy keynotes and the gritty lessons-learned presentations at Oracle’s massive OpenWorld 2011 conference, and it’s a Keith Moon kind of drumbeat: fast, insistent, and all over the place. More »

  • We don’t make the plans. We make the plans work.

    Andrew Atkinson, Director, Product Marketing, E2open - Thursday, September 01, 2011 - 0 Comments
    Andrew Atkinson - We don’t make the plans. We make the plans work.

    Planning is a critical first step to ensuring that the important things – in life, in love, in work – actually get done. The only problem is that, like people, companies often get stuck after this initial step. For some, "analysis paralysis" comes to mind, especially in today's volatile supply chain environment. But once we have the plans, how do we actually make them work? More »

  • Just another manic Monday for S&OP?

    Andrew Atkinson, Director, Product Marketing, E2open - Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - 0 Comments
    Andrew Atkinson - Just another manic Monday for S&OP?

    S&OP is a hot topic once again, despite hardly being a new one. This renewed popularity is a result of the increasing need for more accurate planning driven by a tough economy, increased globalization, and fierce competition. And the arrival of new, cloud-based collaboration tools — designed to respond to this new world and to close the loop between planning and execution — just may mean that more accurate planning is on the horizon. While no plan ever survives contact with reality, this new generation of solutions gives us the tools we need to put plans into action and respond to disruptions faster when they occur. What does S&OP look like without these tools? Try this scenario on for size... More »