What Retailers Need to Know About the Maturing of Supplier Relationship Management

This Global Retail Insights Perspective discusses how increased supply chain complexity and a heightened focus on private-branded products by a broader range of retailers necessitate identifying and implementing technologies that enable better visibility and control of both processes and partners in the supply network. The big three product life-cycle management (PLM) vendors - Siemens, Dassault, and PTC - offer an array of capabilities but are often dismissed by retailers, overwhelmed by the depth of design capabilities and, yet, underwhelmed by their ability to manage the facets of the product life cycle important to them. Additionally, these vendors often fall short on providing the necessary workflow and integration between product design, planning, sourcing, purchasing, logistics, and order management processes that retailers need. However, these PLM vendors are introducing capabilities and creating partnerships that help them bridge some of these gaps.