Operations management

1. Manufacturing
sector: Food
and Beverage
Industry
• The major issues faced by the manufacturing firms due to
COVID-19 pandemic was the impact on their supply chain. Major
issues faced by the firms by almost all the industries in this sector
was the supply disruption. This manifested in the form of
uncertainty among the buyers about the raw materials, shortages
of raw materials and packaging materials, availability of parts
from the vendor (service level impacted). The other challenge
was that in anticipation of demand, inventories were piled up at
various stages of the supply chain. This phenomenon was more
prominent in the food and beverage sector which witnessed
surge in demand due to uncertainty of the lockdown scenario.
The unpredictability of the demand affected almost all the
industries in the sector but the most prominent were food and
beverage, automobile and pharmaceutical. The other major issue
faced by the manufacturing firms is related to the shortage
labour force due to lockdown and social distancing norms.
https://web.iima.ac.in/assets/snippets/workingpaperpdf/98524442182022-06-01.pdf

2. • Labor Issue
• Labor shortages were one of the biggest disruptions to supply chains during the pandemic. The labor industry was also impacted by
quarantine periods, illness, masks, and personal protection. Not having available workers slows down supply chains, leading to longer
lead times and less product on shelves.
• Due to Lack of Labor, Shortage of Raw Material and Packing Material and transportation glitch, the companies could not supply
products to the consumers on time.
https://scholarworks.uark.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1022&context=scmtuht
Supply Chain Issues:
• Sourcing Challenges
• The pandemic made it hard for companies to receive their products in a timely fashion. A lack of workers to produce products,
transport products, and receive products all lead to shortages of food and beverage items.
• The Unpredictable demand and change of forecasts put the Purchase & PPIC function (production planning and inventory control)
under tremendous stress. The entire industry had come to a standstill, which disrupted the material availability when needed the
most.
• Unpredictable Demand
• Demand remained volatile and unpredictable for all businesses and product lines. B2C demand suddenly was more than double,
while the Foodservice/QSR requirements tanked. Within B2B, the need for ingredients for packaged foods segment/RTE/RTC like
Chips, noodles, frozen food, etc., skyrocketed.
• There was a significant change in the product mix within the increased demand. One example is the snacks & Noodles manufacturers
shifted their focus to bigger pack sizes & higher profitability products.

3. Four Capabilities to Take the
Food and Beverage Supply
Chain to the Next Level:
• Food and beverage companies run on razor-thin margins.
Optimizing end-to-end supply chain operations should be a top
objective of an F&B supply chain leader. The only way to
accomplish this is through solving for the optimal supply plan
while simultaneously considering all constraints, costs and
capacities across the extended supply chain. Supply planning
enables you to profitably satisfy market demand through
dynamically sourcing materials, optimizing production and
manufacturing plans, reducing distribution costs and slashing lead
times.
• This is accomplished through powerful and easy-to-use
optimization algorithms, the evaluation of multiple supply plan
alternatives through numerical and graphical simulations, and
multiple “what-if” analyses.
Supply
Planning and
Optimization
• As food and beverage manufacturers become more demand-
driven, often there is a shift toward more frequent changes in
production runs. These market requirements must be balanced
with the traditional desire for maximum production
efficiency. Changeovers are among the most difficult constraints
to optimize, and this places even greater pressure on
manufacturing teams to be more agile to minimize lost production
time and capacity.
• You can minimize changes due to activities such as allergen cleans
and packaging configuration by optimizing the sequence of
products through the manufacturing line. Every manufacturing
plant has its own distinct characteristics and operating
requirements, so your planning solution must quickly adapt to the
characteristics of the plant and not the other way around.
Advanced
Planning and
Scheduling
(APS)
https://www.logility.com/blog/five-capabilities-to-take-the-food-and-beverage-
supply-chain-to-the-next-level/

4. Four Capabilities to Take the Food and Beverage Supply
Chain to the Next Level:
https://www.logility.com/blog/five-capabilities-to-take-the-food-and-beverage-
supply-chain-to-the-next-level/
The use of predictive, prescriptive and cognitive analytics in the F&B supply chain can lead to the next
competitive breakthrough. Companies can use data to support “fact-based” decision-making to mitigate risk
and capture business opportunities.
Predictive analytics helps companies get out in front of events and disruptions to enable a proactive approach
to determine “what will, or could, happen”.
Prescriptive analytics answers the question, “what should I do” to maximize profits, minimize costs, and/or
meet customer requirements.
Cognitive analytics is the highest stage of analytics and involves automated resolution through artificial
intelligence and machine learning.
Advanced
Analytics
Integrated Business Planning (IBP) gives you the opportunity to unite strategic and tactical planning to represent
both volumetric and financial information into one flexible planning and decision support capability for strategic
and tactical planning. IBP combines data from sales, marketing, production, procurement, transportation and
finance to create a powerful decision center for all stakeholders. By removing organizational and technology
barriers, and aligning and synchronizing plans, an IBP platform ensures your business plans are rooted in
feasible supply chain network capabilities, with resources and investments deployed where they are most
effective in achieving business goals.
Integrated
Business
Planning
(IBP)