Sustainable Supply Chain Digital supply chains helping in an uncertain world - a chat with Hans Thalbauer (@HansThalbauer)
My guest on this episode of the Digital Supply Chain podcast is Hans Thalbauer (@HansThalbauer). Hans leads go to market and sales for Digital Supply chain for SAP globally.
Hans and I attended the African SAP User Group conference Saphila and I sat in on Han’s presentation where he talked about how Digital Supply Chains can help organisations in times of uncertainty. I found his presentation fascinating, so I asked him to come on the show to talk about it.
At 00:44 I asked Hans to summarise the talk he gave - why the times we are in are uncertain, and how Digital Supply Chains can help organisations
At 01:18 Hans replied talking about the kinds of volatility you see all the time in supply chains - weather events, earthquakes, etc. He also talked about some of the extraordinary geopolitical events that are unfolding right now and how they impact supply chains. Hans talked about how organisations can not only use digital supply chains not only to help cope with these events but to use them as an opportunity to thrive in this uncertainty.
At 04:52 I asked Hans what solutions Digital Supply Chains have that can help companies survive/thrive volatility
At 05:02 Hans replied that companies need to be digitally connected with business partners, connected with assets “the things” (Internet of Things), and connected with customer data (possibly even experience data).
At 09:34 I asked Hans how we move from a situation where 5-10% of things and partners are connected to 100%, and how do we then handle the huge influx of data this will create
At 09:56 Hans explained that this needs to happen in a stepwise fashion with the steps dependent on each individual companies business and priorities
AT 11:58 I asked how we can encourage the 90% of partners that are not digitally connected, to connect
And at 12:08 Hans pointed out that now we are in a situation where it is far easier to connect that it was in the past
At 13:59 I asked how long it would be before the vast majority of partners and the things are connected
At 14:07 Hans said that it will happen in some regions before others
At 16:41 I asked Hans if there was any question I hadn’t asked him which he thought I should have
At 16:56 Hans replied that not only is volatility an iss
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