On Nov 17th, 2020, we hosted a webinar on 'How can SAP Logistics Business Network (LBN) help improve your Logistics Performance?' along with experts from SAP and Uber Freight. In the light of unprecedented crises faced across businesses worldwide, supply chain and logistics have been in the limelight. There is an undeniable need for companies to focus on resilience within supply chains.
The industry is experiencing a wave of digitization. The pandemic and its aftermath seem to have accelerated the process to a degree where businesses incapable of evolving will eventually perish. Therefore, what companies learn throughout this phase of uncertainty and rising complexities in a supply chain will serve as a handbook to navigate through the post-pandemic world.
The session's emphasis remained on the need for transparency and collaboration between shippers, carriers, freight forwarders, or logistics service providers to build more resilient supply chains.
SAP provides a unique digital platform - Logistics Business Network (LBN), that helps businesses build more resilient supply chains with enhanced visibility, collaboration, and efficiency through a unified business network. The functionalities of the SAP LBN are multiple and have several benefits for businesses. Recently SAP and Uber Freight joined hands to extend the reach of collaborative logistics matching demand with supply to a broader spectrum of customers through robust networks.
Cam Patters, Director of Digital Logistics, North America, SAP, spoke about what SAP envisions for Logistics Business Network and its overall fit in SAP's Intelligent Logistics Enterprise ecosystem. Drew Huening, Sales Engineer, Uber Freight, talked extensively about how the Uber Freight algorithm works. He emphasized how Uber Freight's native integration with SAP LBN can create a network of available freight capacity where shippers can access instant, real-time pricing data revolutionizing the whole course of freight booking into an intelligent process.
Mert Kutluay, Sr. SAP SCM Consultant, and Suhas Balakrishna, SAP SCM Consultant, Novigo detailed an overview of the LBN-SAP ecosystem and the multiple avenues such kind of collaborative practices can open for businesses to optimize supply chains. You can now access the webinar on-demand.
The webinar was a success, and we had many takeaways. However, we're going to emphasize the three most significant learnings from this online event.
Digitization can curb many supply chain inefficiencies that have plagued the industry for a long time. SAP LBN is essentially a step towards embracing a more digitized supply chain. SAP LBN can mean:
- Collaborative logistics: that can enable a paradigm shift from an enterprise-centric approach towards a network-centric approach to eliminate the numerous silos that organizations function in even today. With collaboration comes improved tracking and visibility within the supply chain.
- Easy set-up of logistics network: The other benefits include easier onboarding and the addition of carriers to a company's logistics network with LBN.
- Cost savings: Cheaper costs of deployment and maintenance are other added benefits.
SAP LBN helps build an ecosystem for your logistics operations by integrating with external vendors with standard interfaces. A Company's Logistics Network consists of various building blocks to ensure a smooth and resilient network. SAP LBN has different standard interfaces that allow multiple systems to be connected to the LBN tenant and help establish a more robust network. Furthermore, supply chain visibility and spot rate scenarios are essential for businesses.
An interface with digital carriers such as Uber Freight helps obtain instant rates for a given shipment, ensuring the safety of the shipment and 100% guarantee that Uber Freight Carrier will always accept a valid shipment. This helps mitigate the most significant risk of non-delivery of a shipment. Connections with other external systems are a value-addition, such as integration with Project44 can enhance visibility manifold. Please watch our webinar on GTT to know more.
The ease with which a shipper can onboard a new carrier onto the logistics network is one of the best features of LBN. Once a carrier is added to LBN, they receive a unique "LBN ID," which can be used by any other shipper on LBN to onboard the same carrier. Therefore, it is a significant player in uniting and having numerous large and small carriers and trucking companies connected. Once onboarded, this vast pool of shippers & carriers makes it easy to match demand with supply. Having an efficient and economical process is the other added benefit.
Novigo's focus remains on identifying new ways of running smarter supply chains by uncovering the potential in business process improvement, enabled by SAP SCM/TM technology and delivered by empowered and enabled people. We are constantly striving to ensure resilience within supply chains and better readiness for the future. Our constant endeavor to enable digitization in supply chains has taken a major step in understanding LBN, its functionalities, and its advantages for businesses. With the rising need for more digitized processes, many companies are demanding logistics solutions such as the LBN. Our expertise and collaborations with this innovative SAP product make us the right partners for implementing LBN for your business. To learn more, feel free to request a demo with us.