Personal Predictions for Supply Chain Management in 2015

Dear readers. I hope you enjoyed reading this blog in 2014. Based on dozens of discussions I had throughout the year, I would like to share my predictions for topics that could become important in supply chain management in 2015 with you. First, I believe that ethical issues will soon play a much more important role than ever, as, so far, social standards or animal rights have too often been neglected in our textbooks. Second, a supply chain consists of relationships between people, who work in teams and groups across independent companies. So, there might soon be a supplementation of the traditional view of the supply chain as a network of black boxes called “suppliers”, “buyers”, “consumers”. Finally, better technologies and algorithms, and, thus, lower transaction costs, might soon make the old SCM dream come true to integrate the end-to-end supply chain. We might soon see totally new business models (enterprise mobility linked to SCM could be a good example). I wish you a good start into 2015.