The Importance of Transportation in Logistic Between a successful and Term Paper

The Importance of Transportation in Logistic Between a successful and unsuccessful company - Term Paper Example According to the excerpts of the company’s CEO, Phil Knight, the implication of the event created considerable supply issues related to unplanned or uncertain inventory shortages or excess supply. When the company’s inventory did not match with the market demand, it had to offer huge discounts and slash prices of products to clear the additional stock piles. The strategy may not be considered as favorable business decision since getting rid of excess inventory in form of allowing huge discounts to customer puts pressure on company’s profitability and gross margins. On further analysis it was found that the company’s failure to implement successful supply chain planning system can be blamed to â€Å"big bang† or at-one-go deployment approach where the company chose to integrate the supply chain management system with their business strategy in a single phase instead of disciplined step-by-step implementation approach (Stanford University, 2000). The Story of a Successful Logistics Firm – DHL DHL is a German Logistics company that provides international services in express mail. The success is revealed from the fact that the market leader in air and sea mail supply chain and logistics (DHL Express, 2013). Despite of facing numerous challenges every day in carrying out daily operations such as traffics and systematic uncertainties (such as natural calamity, political strikes, etc.), the company is able to optimizing its transport and logistics in metropolitan cities. The company has been able to deliver their un-interrupted services to customers since 1969 which is worth appreciating when one considers traffic congestions, energy consumption, and traffic environment in the economy (Times of Malta, 2011). As the cities around the world starts to modernize from semi-urbanized to urban societies, the challenges of tracking, maintaining and controlling city logistics are becoming more challenging for the company. The company h as traditionally relied on strong distribution network and swift customer service to offer prompt and efficient delivery. With the passage of time the company had to depend on modern software and technologies to handle throughput. As business strategy, the company focuses on latest technology to support supply chain and logistics functions. Over time, the company’s network grew larger and customer base increased significantly in every corner of world. The company’s total network links over 220 territories and counties (DHL, 2013). Comparison between the Successful and Unsuccessful Logistics Firms Difference in Strategic Implementation DHL’s strategic implementation of supply chain management and logistics is completely centered on their customers. The company extensively researches and analyzes issues related to economy, logistics, technology, society and environment. It then assess their impact on their business operations with the objective to determine the be st possible combination of technology and networks that has the potential to reduce delivery time of providing services to customers and also reduce company’s cost of operations. The company follows a systematic analytical approach in implementation of their business strategy. The company foll