Knowing who your tier 2 and 3 suppliers are and where they’re located is only one of the ways that artificial intelligence (AI) is able to connect multi-tier supply chain data to build resilience in your business. The future of AI in supply chain management is here.  

While manufacturers couldn’t have predicted the Suez Canal blockage, or a pandemic’s effects on the ability to produce and ship goods - it’s never been more apparent that just-in-time manufacturing needs to evolve to meet the needs of our increasingly interconnected world.

The semiconductor shortage of 2020 was a harrowing look at what can happen to an entire industry when a perfect storm of quickly increasing demand and constrained logistics converge without warning. The effects of the semiconductor shortage to the automotive industry are the most profound:

• 83 million cars and SUVs are sold year globally and modern cars can have around 1,500 to 3,000 semiconductor chips per car
• Only 31 semiconductor fabrication houses exist globally
• The industry expects to lose $100 billion this year in sales due to lack of semiconductor supply.

Unsurprisingly, the company that forged the just-in-time manufacturing frontier was prepared for the semiconductor shortage with a plethora of contingency plans, and was positioned better than their competitors. The strength of Toyota’s supply chain had already been tested and failed in 2011 when a tsunami in Japan caused the business to suffer greatly over the period of six months. Using history as its teacher, Toyota developed a warning system for potential shortages and painstakingly monitored their small suppliers, enabling them to prepare by stockpiling semiconductors or part alternatives.

Know Your Multi-Tier Supply Chain with AI Supply Chain Management

The Altana Atlas’ data on tens of millions of suppliers and supply chain facilities can help your business make more informed decisions in your interdependent, multi-tier supply chain. Uncover hidden chokepoints and dependencies beyond your direct supplier relationships using the Atlas as a single source of truth that can help you stay ahead of your competitors as the market shifts. This modern supply chain management platform can illuminate and alert you to concentrations of risk or single points of failure across companies, suppliers, parts, geographies, and port and trade lane levels. 

To give you peace of mind on your supply chain, the Altana Atlas offers:

• Multi-tier value chain mapping to strengthen your data, know your suppliers’ locations and evolve your view as the world evolves 
  
• Supply chain planning across multiple tiers to unlock hidden interdependencies beyond your direct supplier, for more thorough planning to stay ahead of market shifts
  
• Supply chain risk management to help you build resilience across your extended supply chain, monitor what matters, and gain a unified view of risks across your supply chain.
  
• AI-based supplier management with AI-based decision support to improve your supplier base, deepen relationships with reliable suppliers and improve your supplier base.

Read more about the lessons learned from the auto semiconductor shortage using insights from the Altana Atlas and find out how you can stitch together the silos in your supply chain in our new case study.