Michelin

Michelin has been a Blue Yonder customer since 2003. However in 2014 Michelin decided to deploy Blue Yonder’s agile implementation approach, which includes a sequence of three-week sprints of designing, constructing, testing and validating the solution. This rapid prototyping methodology enabled the team to learn and mature quickly in their use of the solution while achieving results through each phase of the project, ensuring adoption by the business. A key enabler of this approach was the use of Blue Yonder cloud launch to support rapid deployment and performance testing.

Además de la implementación organizacional y tecnológica, Michelin llevó a cabo un análisis de brechas de sus procesos de S&OP y su posición en la curva de madurez de S&OP. Los equipos identificaron brechas en los procesos y problemas de consistencia de datos, y elaboraron un plan de acción para cerrarlas. El plan de acción se convirtió en objetivos mensuales, junto con revisiones mensuales del estado, para reforzar la responsabilidad en toda la organización. La empresa también se unió al Grupo de Interés Especial de S&OP de Blue Yonder, lo que les permitió aprender de las experiencias y mejores prácticas de otros clientes.

Michelin recurrió a Blue Yonder para obtener apoyo en el proyecto transformacional de S&OP, que abarca cambios en procesos, organización y tecnología, con el fin de mejorar sus decisiones de planificación de la cadena de suministro y la alineación interfuncional.

Las capacidades de planificación de ventas y operaciones de Blue Yonder permitieron a Michelin compartir dentro del equipo ejecutivo de la unidad de negocio un plan común de demanda, ventas y producción, y gestionar las prioridades. También permite a la empresa equilibrar la demanda con la capacidad en un horizonte de 12 a 18 meses, un proceso a menudo denominado equilibrio táctico o planificación aproximada de capacidad.

A principios de 2017, Michelin comenzó un estudio de reorganización para modificar en profundidad su estructura empresarial. La capacidad de colaboración en la S&OP de Blue Yonder desempeñó un papel integral, ya que permitió a diversas entidades (como la manufactura, las regiones y las líneas de negocio) colaborar para desarrollar planes comunes de ventas, producción y existencias tácticas, y fue uno de los principales impulsores de una rápida transición de la antigua organización a la nueva.

Desde enero de 2018, las principales actividades de Michelin a nivel mundial han sido impulsadas con las capacidades de la S&OP de Blue Yonder y una hoja de ruta para el despliegue de herramientas. La solución respalda un proceso y una red estandarizados para compartir las mejores prácticas, empoderando a las plantas y a las organizaciones de ventas con una nueva herramienta de colaboración. También permite hacer simulaciones locales para apoyar la gestión de la demanda en las regiones, así como la gestión de la capacidad en las plantas, utilizando un único conjunto de datos para asegurar la coherencia.

Moving to an end-to-end supply chain solution, globally 

Having used Blue Yonder and a number of legacy applications for many years, in 2019 Michelin decided to deploy one set of Blue Yonder solutions across the entire organization (across all business lines in all regions), supported by new standardized business processes. Deploying Blue Yonder technology as its backbone solution became mandatory for each business line to ensure uniform decision-making and faster monthly consolidations.

Since migrating from a regionally based supply chain supported by fragmented legacy systems to the new Blue Yonder-based global solution it has seen significant improvements. Focused solely on fulfilment, Michelin estimates it has saved about 2 days of inventory by improving daily planning. 

“Having used the Blue Yonder applications for many years, we have a huge understanding of their capabilities and all the many options for parameterization. So, we know that in the Blue Yonder solutions, there are a lot of options to help us fine-tune the processes to address each market segment.” 

Transportation Management Solution reduces CO2 emissions

Another example of success is around the Blue Yonder transport management system (TMS). Michelin has increased the correct loading of trucks by 2%, resulting in significant logistics cost savings and a reduction in CO2 emissions. 

A new segmented supply chain

Around 2024, Michelin recognized its current global supply chain was functioning well but was based on a ‘one size fits all’ design—with the same service offering everywhere for all customers, across all products. This was deemed inadequate to take the company forward in a world where customer demands are changing so quickly. 

“We decided that we needed to adapt. But instead of trying to take the full supply chain design forward, we decided to split this big problem into several smaller problems. We defined our market into product and customer clusters or segments. We defined for each segment of customers a level of service that we wanted to propose.”

Michelin designed the business model around these customer segments, defining the level of ‘cost-to-serve’ and profitability of the different product segments in each case, together with target KPIs for product availability.

Relationship built on trust

“The 25-year relationship between Michelin and Blue Yonder is very healthy, and we have a lot of fun, which is important. But what is key for me is that the relationship is based on trust.  When we trust each other, we can be demanding with each other. And this is what we do.  Although we can be very challenging as a customer, between us, we are constantly striving for new levels of success.”

“The next stage of our journey is a move to SaaS, and we will be doing lots of work with Blue Yonder to help us identify and define the business value of this important migration. This is the next key step in our relationship.”

“Our relationship is in a good place, and we have much work ahead of us. But the nice thing to remind ourselves is that in every delivery of Michelin tires that we do every day, we can see there is a touch from Blue Yonder at every stage of our customer delivery.”