At the end of January, Oracle announced new updates to its Oracle Fusion Cloud Global Supply Chain & Manufacturing (SCM) offering. The updates focus on helping shippers augment global supply chain efficiencies to connect their supply networks with an integrated cloud business application suite.
According to the company, the updates are for subsets in Oracle Fusion Cloud Global SCM, which includes Oracle Transportation Management (OTM) and Oracle Global Trade Management (GTM). They're geared toward helping shippers reduce costs, make better planning decisions, and improve customer experiences.
Among the new updates, Oracle’s logistics machine learning is set to accurately predict transit times and reduce costs associated with unplanned delays. Connected logistics, which use IoT networks to predict and manage shipments and inventory while monitoring location and conditions, will also augment this area. Additionally, ocean-based enhancements will help customers automate transactions with ocean carriers from booking through financial settlement, and a 3D load configuration editor will help customers manage container-based shipments.
One of the most exciting benefits of these upgrades for shippers is increased flexibility, efficiency, and automated decision support. Notably, these updates address supply chain issues made apparent at the beginning of the pandemic. Oracle Vice president of Supply Chain Management Product Strategy, Derek Gittoes, explained that the pandemic exposed gaps within global supply chains, which impacted organizations' ability to serve their customers and forced businesses to accelerate plans to modernize their supply chains.
"Since the new offerings in Oracle Transportation Management and Oracle Global Trade Management help customers reduce costs, make better planning decisions, and improve the customer experience, the enhancements will help organizations build the resilient supply chains they need to continue growing their businesses while navigating the evolving challenges across the industry," he said.
Essentially, the new upgrades can help companies cope with current capacity constraints and freight challenges such as container shortages and ocean load price spikes. They also enable users to play out scenarios and balance best and worst-case scenario planning, giving shippers the chance to be more creative in obtaining capacity.
