Retail SCM Summit 2011

China. Perhaps the biggest arena for future development in logistics and supply chain management? It could be, because China is a rising economic powerhouse and on its way to become the world’s second largest consumer market after the United States. This means that domestic supply chains will be as if not even more important to China than international supply chains. With the government putting high priority on boosting domestic consumption, Chinese retailers need to understand and be able to cater to the increasingly sophisticated Chinese consumer. This is the backdrop for the Retail Supply Chain Management Summit 2011, hosted by the Global Leaders Institute in Shanghai, China on December 6 & 7, 2011, with the support of Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP) and China Logistics Association (CLA).

A rising star

China is a country that is slowly but surely creeping into this blog, and regular readers of my blog will already be familiar with some of my previous posts, such as

• A post on the China toy recall crisis of 2007 that blames America more than China for what happened, and maybe it is true?
• A post about Guanxi and Chinese versus Western business culture, providing some fertile grounds for cultural reflections if you’re doing business in China.
• A post that explains why the Chinese word for crisis does not mean opportunity, and and how this myth came about in the western world.
• A post on a call for papers on supply chain risk management practices in China by the International Journal of Applied Management Science.

Thus, with China soon to became a logistics and SCM hotspot, it is only natural to add this conference call, and it is most certainly not the last time China will be featured on this blog.

The Retail Supply Chain Management Summit 2011

I’m impressed with the broad scope of the conference and the conference flier lists a number of very interesting speakers – and surprisingly many Non-Chinese – who will talk about such things as:

• Agile & Sustainable Supply Chains
• Demand-Driven Value Network
• Identifying Weak Links in your Supply Chain
• Cost-to-Serve • Risk Management in Global Sourcing
• Suppliers Management & Process Integration
• Inventory Optimization in a Dynamic and Rapidly-Changing Environment
• Transforming your Supply Chain to Achieve Multi-Channel Synergy
• E-commerce B2C Distribution Needs
• Logistics Planning in China’s Lower Cities
• Selecting & Evaluating Third Party Service Providers
• Leveraging Private Label Products
• Intelligence-Driven Retailing & Technology Enablers

How to Mitigate Risk from Global Sourcing: Best Practices & Lessons Learned

The catastrophic March 11 earthquake in Japan and its aftermath forces businesses to re-examine their global sourcing strategies. While offshore sourcing can be advantageous in many ways, growing supply chain complexities require superior management. How to align supply and demand in day-to-day operations? How to avoid supply chain disruptions in times of natural disaster? Will the anticipated savings from global sourcing actually be realized? Hear how best-in-class retailers minimize risk exposures and achieve leverage: e-sourcing solutions, emergency logistics and structured risk management systems.

Ian Duffy, CEO of Asia Pacific Region, IKEA

That’s a presentation I definitely wouldn’t want to miss. Other interesting speakers include

• Gary Maxwell, SVP of International Supply Chain, Walmart
  Agility: A Key Element of SCM Strategy 
• Tim Minges, Chairman, PepsiCo China
  Identifying Weak Links in Your Supply Chain: A Holistic Approach
• Chris Nielsen, CFO & COO, Zappos.com
  Reverse Logistics—From Black Hole to Untapped Revenue Stream
• WU Jianzhong, Chairman, WU MART
  Building Deep Supplier Relationships to Manage Market Volatility
• Marc Onetto, SVP of World Operations, Amazon.com
  Inventory Optimization in a Dynamic and Rapid‐Changing Environment

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