Supply Chain From The Field

Dec 2, 2010

Supply Chain Analytics: The New Frontier

Presentations by industry speakers and student teams at this year’s SCRC meeting on December 2 were once again outstanding.  The topic this year, supply chain analytics, provided a wealth of… 

Nov 29, 2010

SEC Raids Offices of NY Hedge Funds: What is Considered "Legal Market Intelligence" in this Environment??

Last week the SEC raided many offices of small to medium hedge funds.  Research companies pay experts who provide information to their clients – typically information that is used to… 

Nov 7, 2010

Are Companies Considering the Risks of BPO?

In our recent study of Business Process Outsourcing Trends, we identified a number of other interesting trends.  First, roughly 50% of companies surveyed have continued to maintain their current back… 

Nov 5, 2010

Sustainable Supply Chains: Who's the Best (In Our Opinion)..

Students in my MBA610 Class, Sustainable Supply Chain Management, recently completed an evaluation of a set of 105 Fortune 500 companies.  The students assessed the companies using a maturity model… 

Oct 1, 2010

New Research Paper on Spend Management

Over the summer, an NC State research team was assembled which performed a thorough analysis of spend analysis best practices (see the full version of the research paper). A number of… 

Sep 28, 2010

A Defined Process for Business Process Outsourcing: Will Core Competency Focus Take Jobs Offshore?

The administration in Washington is beginning to push around a bill that will punish companies who offshore US jobs overseas.  While the rationale is certainly appealing to the common man,… 

Sep 20, 2010

BP Caps the Hole: Closure, or the Beginning of a New Era?

The announcement that BP finally capped the oil today brings about a number of questions related to on-going exploration in the gulf, the future of oil in the US, and… 

Sep 4, 2010

How important is data cleansing in spend management?

I recently entered into an interesting debate with a software provider who was developing software for the healthcare industry.  (See the previous post and white paper on spend management in… 

Jul 29, 2010

Spend Management Solutions for the Healthcare Industry: An Industry Assessment

Spend Management in Healthcare The SCRC recently conducted an industry study, led by Dr. Handfield, and four MBA students (Ragesh Rajan, Rahul Sharma, Sangrum Chavan, and Swetha Menta) on the… 

Jul 17, 2010

Why Healthcare Needs to Think About Spend Management Solutions

Healthcare providers are facing continued lower operating margins, increased risks and potentially once-in-a-lifetime health care reform.  With this backdrop, there is an increasing focus on Supply Chain Management as a…