Supply chain management (SCM) is the oversight of materials, information, and finances as they move in a process from supplier

to manufacturer to wholesaler to retailer to consumer. Supply chain management involves coordinating and integrating these flows both within and among companies. It is said that the ultimate goal of any effective supply chain management system is to reduce inventory (with the assumption that products are available when needed). As a solution for successful supply chain management, sophisticated software systems with Web interfaces are competing with Web-based application service providers (ASP) who promise to provide part or all of the SCM service for companies who rent their service. Supply chain management flows can be divided into three main flows:

The product flow The information flow The finances flow The product flow includes the movement of goods from a supplier to a customer, as well as any customer returns or service needs. The information flow involves transmitting orders and updating the status of delivery. The financial flow consists of credit terms, payment schedules, and consignment and title ownership arrangements. There are two main types of SCM software: planning applications and execution applications. Planning applications use advanced algorithms to determine the best way to fill an order. Execution applications track the physical status of goods, the management of materials, and financial information involving all parties.

Some SCM applications are based on open data models that support the sharing of data both inside and outside the enterprise (this is called the extended enterprise, and includes key suppliers, manufacturers, and end customers of a specific company). This shared data may reside in diverse database systems, or data warehouses, at several different sites and companies. By sharing this data "upstream" (with a company's suppliers) and "downstream" (with a company's clients), SCM applications have the potential to improve the time-tomarket of products, reduce costs, and allow all parties in the supply chain to better manage current resources and plan for future needs. Increasing numbers of companies are turning to Web sites and Web-based applications as part of the SCM solution. A number of major Web sites offer eprocurement marketplaces where manufacturers can trade and even make auction bids with suppliers

A supply chain is a network of facilities and distribution options that performs the functions of procurement of materials, transformation of these materials into intermediate and finished products, and the distribution of these finished products to customers. Supply chains exist in both service and manufacturing organizations, although the complexity of the chain may vary greatly from industry to industry and firm to firm. Below is an example of a very simple supply chain for a single product, where raw material is procured from vendors, transformed into finished goods in a single step, and then transported to distribution centers, and ultimately, customers. Realistic supply chains have multiple end products with shared components, facilities and capacities. The flow of materials is not always along an arborescent network, various modes of transportation may be considered, and the bill of materials for the end items may be both deep and large.
Four Key Benefits of Supply Chain Management Software
A supply chain software can offer tremendous value to any company that relies on the smooth planning and execution of related operations to achieve long-term profitability and maintain a solid competitive edge. Thats why more and more organizations are purchasing and implementing supply chain applications. In fact, the market for supply chain and related softwares is expected to reach $7.4 billion in 2008, according to a report by ARC Advisory Group. What are the key benefits of todays leading supply chain software? Improve Your Supply Chain Network Supply chain softwares provide complete, 360 degree visibility across the entire supply chain network something that cannot be easily achieved with disjointed manual processes. With supply chain, users can monitor the status of all activities across all suppliers, production plants, storage facilities, and distribution centers. This enables more effective tracking and management of all related processes, from the ordering and acquisition of raw materials, through manufacturing and shipping of finished goods to customers or retail outlets. So the status of mission-critical activities can be tracked at all times, and potential inefficiencies or problems can be identified and corrected immediately, before they become unmanageable. Minimized Delays Many supply chains particularly those that havent been enhanced with a supply chain application are plagued by delays that can result in poor relationships and lost business. Late shipments from vendors, slow downs on production lines, and logistical errors in distribution channels are all common issues that can negatively impact a companys ability to satisfy customer demand for its products. With supply chain software, all activities can be seamlessly coordinated and executed from start to finish, ensuring much higher levels of on-time delivery across the board. Enhanced Collaboration Imagine having the ability to know exactly what your suppliers and distributors are doing at all times and vice versa. Supply chain softwares make that possible, bridging the gap between disparate business softwares at remote locations to dramatically improve collaboration among supply chain partners. With supply chain softwares, all participants can dynamically share vital information such as demand trend reports, forecasts, inventory levels, order statuses, and transportation plans in real-time. This type of instantaneous, unhindered communication and data-sharing will help keep all key stakeholders informed, so supply chain processes can run as flawlessly as possible.

Reduced Costs A supply chain software can help reduce overhead expenses in a variety of ways. For example, it can:

Improve inventory management, facilitating the successful implementation of just-in-time stock models, and eliminating the strain on real estate and financial resources caused by the need to store excess components and finished goods Enable more effective demand planning, so production output levels can be set to most effectively address customer requirements without the shortages that result in lost sales, or the waste that drains budgets Improve relationships with vendors and distributors, so purchasing and logistics professionals can identify cost-cutting opportunities such as volume discounts.

What are the benefits of Supply Chain Management (SCM)?

SCM can help you transform a traditional linear supply chain into an adaptive network with the following benefits.

With the increased visibility into the supply chain and adaptive supply chain network, you can be more responsive. You can sense and respond quickly to changes and quickly capitalize on new opportunities. By offering a common information framework that supports communication and collaboration, SCM enables you to better adapt to and meet customer demands. You can track and monitor compliance in areas as environment, health and safety. Information transparency and real-time business intelligence can lead to shorter cash-tocash cycle times. Reduced inventory levels and increased inventory turns across the network can lower overall costs. With SCM, you can lower operational expenses with timelier planning for procurement, manufacturing and transportation. Better order, product and execution tracking can lead to improvements in performance and quality - and lower costs. You can also improve margins through better coordination with business partners. Tight connection with trading partners keep your supply chain aligned with current business strategies and priorities, improving your organization's overall performance and achievement of goals.

Benefits Complexity may increase with the addition of each location and supplier in your outbound network, but so does the potential value supply chain management can provide. Solutions designed, implemented, and operated with reliable and valid measurements ensure tangible benefits flow from commercial commitment to contract execution. Benefit Reduced Costs How Transfer fixed administration and management costs to a purchased service based on through put.

A Diversity of Modes
Transport modes are the means by which people and freight achieve mobility. They fall into one of three basic types, depending on over what surface they travel land (road, rail and pipelines), water (shipping), and air. Each mode is characterized by a set of technical, operational and commercial characteristics: Road transportation (Concept 2). Road infrastructures are large consumers of space with the lowest level of physical constraints among transportation modes. However, physiographical constraints are significant in road construction with substantial additional costs to overcome features such as rivers or rugged terrain. Road transportation has an average operational flexibility as vehicles can serve several purposes but are rarely able to move outside roads. Road transport systems have high maintenance costs, both for the vehicles and infrastructures. They are mainly linked to light industries where rapid movements of freight in small batches are the norm. Yet, with containerization, road transportation has become a crucial link in freight distribution. Rail transportation (Concept 3). Railways are composed of a traced path on which are bound vehicles. They have an average level of physical constrains linked to the types of locomotives and a low gradient is required, particularly for freight. Heavy industries are traditionally linked with rail transport systems, although containerization has improved the flexibility of rail transportation by linking it with road and maritime modes. Rail is by far the land transportation mode offering the highest capacity with a 23,000 tons fully loaded coal unit train being the heaviest load ever carried. Gauges, however, vary around the world, often complicating the integration of rail systems. Pipelines (Concept 3). Pipeline routes are practically unlimited as they can be laid on land or under water. The longest gas pipeline links Alberta to Sarnia (Canada), which is 2,911 km in length. The longest oil pipeline is the Transiberian, extending over 9,344 km from the Russian arctic oilfields in eastern Siberia to Western Europe. Physical constraints are low and include the landscape and pergelisol in arctic or subarctic environments. Pipeline construction costs vary according to the diameter and increase proportionally with the distance and with the viscosity of fluids (from gas, low viscosity, to oil, high viscosity). The Trans Alaskan pipeline, which is 1,300 km long, was built under difficult conditions and has to be above ground for most of its path. Pipeline terminals are very important since they correspond to refineries and harbors. Maritime transportation (Concept 4). Because of the physical properties of water conferring buoyancy and limited friction, maritime transportation is the most effective mode to move large quantities of cargo over long distances. Main maritime routes are composed of oceans, coasts, seas, lakes, rivers and channels. However, due to the location of economic activities maritime circulation takes place on specific parts of the maritime space, particularly over the North Atlantic and the North Pacific. The construction of channels, locks and dredging are attempts to facilitate maritime circulation by reducing discontinuity. Comprehensive inland waterway systems include Western Europe, the Volga / Don system, St. Lawrence / Great Lakes system, the Mississippi and its tributaries, the Amazon, the Panama / Paraguay and the interior of China. Maritime transportation has high terminal costs, since port infrastructures are among the most expensive to build, maintain and improve. High inventory costs also characterize maritime transportation. More than any other mode, maritime transportation is linked to heavy industries, such as steel and petrochemical facilities adjacent to port sites. Air transportation (Concept 5). Air routes are practically unlimited, but they aredenser over the North Atlantic, inside North America and Europe and over the North Pacific. Air transport constraints are multidimensional and include the site (a commercial plane needs about 3,300 meters of runway for landing and take off), the climate, fog and aerial currents. Air activities are linked to the tertiary and quaternary sectors, notably finance and tourism, which lean on the long distance mobility of people. More recently, air transportation has been

accommodating growing quantities of high value freight and is playing a growing role in global logistics. Intermodal transportation (Concept 6). Concerns a variety of modes used in combination so that the respective advantages of each mode are better exploited. Although intermodal transportation applies for passenger movements, such as the usage of the different, but interconnected modes of a public transit system, it is over freight transportation that the most significant impacts have been observed. Containerization has been a powerful vector of intermodal integration, enabling maritime and land transportation modes to more effectively interconnect. Telecommunications. Cover a grey area in terms of if they can be considered as a transport mode since unlike true transportation, telecommunications often does not have a physicality. Yet, they are structured as networks with a practically unlimited capacity with very low constraints, which may include the physiography and oceanic masses that may impair the setting of cables. They provide for the instantaneous movement of information (speed of light in theory). Wave transmissions, because of their limited coverage, often require substations, such as for cellular phone networks. Satellites are often using a geostationary orbit which is getting crowded. High network costs and low distribution costs characterize many telecommunication networks, which are linked to the tertiary and quaternary sectors (stock markets, business to business information networks, etc). Telecommunications can provide a substitution for personal movements in some economic sectors.

mis
The term data refers to qualitative or quantitative attributes of a variable or set of variables. Data (plural of "datum") are typically the results of measurements and can be the basis ofgraphs, images, or observations of a set of variables. Data are often viewed as the lowest level of abstraction from which information and then knowledge are derived. Raw data, i.e. unprocessed data, refers to a collection of numbers, characters, images or other outputs from devices that collect information to convert physical quantities into symbols. Data is a collection of facts, such as values or measurements. It can be numbers, words, measurements, observations or even just descriptions of things.

Information: data that are processed to be useful; provides answers to "who", "what", "where", and "when" questions. information... information is data that has been given meaning by way of relational connection. This "meaning" can be useful, but does not have to be. In computer parlance, a relational database makes information from the data stored within it.information in its most restricted technical sense is
an ordered sequence of symbols that record or transmit a message. It can be recorded assigns, or conveyed as signals by waves. Information is any kind of event that affects the state of a dynamic [1] system. As a concept, however, information has numerous meanings. Moreover, the concept of information is closely related to notions of constraint, communication, control,data, form, instruction, knowledge, meaning, mental

stimulus, pattern, perception, representation, and especially entropy. The word information is derived

from Latin informare which means "give form to". Types of tps

A batch processing system is one where data are collected together in a batch before processing starts.
The method of data entry for early computers was using punched cards, which were handled in batches, and hence the term batch processing. Each piece of work for a batch processing system is called a job. Batch processing is most suitable for tasks where a large amount of data has to be processed on a regular basis. Examples of batch processing systems include payroll systems and examination report card systems.

Advantages of a batch processing system include

Once the data are submitted for processing, the computer may be left running without human interaction. The computer is only used for a certain period of time for the batch job. Jobs can be scheduled for a time when the computer is not busy.

Disadvantages of a batch processing system include

There is always a delay before work is processed and returned. Batch processing usually involves an expensive computer and a large number of trained staff.
Batch processing is execution of a series of programs ("jobs") on a computer without manual intervention. Batch jobs are set up so they can be run to completion without manual intervention, so all input data is preselected through scripts or command-line parameters. This is in contrast to "online" or interactive programs which prompt the user for such input. A program takes a set of data files as input, processes the data, and produces a set of output data files. This operating environment is termed as "batch processing" because the input data are collected into batches of files and are processed in batches by the program.

Types
[edit]Contrasted

with batch processing

Batch processing is not transaction processing. Batch processing involves processing several transactions at the same time, and the results of each transaction are not immediately available when the transaction is being entered;
[1]

there is a time delay. Transactions are accumulated for a certain period

(say for day) where updates are made especially after work. [edit]Real-time

and batch processing

There are a number of differences between real-time and batch processing. These are outlined below: Each transaction in real-time processing is unique. It is not part of a group of transactions, even though those transactions are processed in the same manner. Transactions in real-time processing are standalone both in the entry to the system and also in the handling of output. Real-time processing requires the master file to be available more often for updating and reference than batch processing. The database is not accessible all of the time for batch processing. Real-time processing has fewer errors than batch processing, as transaction data is validated and entered immediately. With batch processing, the data is organised and stored before the master file is updated. Errors can occur during these steps. Infrequent errors may occur in real-time processing; however, they are often tolerated. It is not practical to shut down the system for infrequent errors. More computer operators are required in real-time processing, as the operations are not centralised. It is more difficult to maintain a real-time processing system than a batch processing system.

A real-time processing system is one that processes data without significant delay.
Examples of real-time processing systems include anti-missile defense systems, airplane landing control system, flight simulation systems, electronic fund transfer systems, and tickets reservation systems. Real-time processing systems are usually interactive processing systems.

Advantages of a real-time processing system include

There is no significant delay for response. Information is always up-to-date. Output from the computer may be used to adjust and improve the input.

Disadvantages of a real-time processing system include

A computer must be dedicated solely to the task. The computer must be continually online.