New Service Level Booster from SCT Increases Delivery Readiness

SCT GmbH, part of the Abels & Kemmner Group, presents the new Service Level Booster, a software tool that uses artificial intelligence to determine what needs to be stocked in the shipping warehouse to ensure timely deliveries to customers. To achieve this at the lowest possible cost, the Service Level Booster optimizes the necessary safety stock for the goods in inventory.

(Herzogenrath near Aachen) SCT GmbH introduces an AI-based software tool to optimize the service level of companies. Its goal is to achieve a demand-oriented delivery readiness level at the lowest inventory values. Companies that have already optimized their stocks with conventional planning systems can reduce their inventory by another 3 to 4%. Consequently, for every one million euros in finished goods inventory, savings of 30,000 to 40,000 euros can be realized. The benefits are even more pronounced for companies whose inventory management has not yet been automated. The tool is equally interesting for medium-sized industrial companies with production warehousing as well as trading companies, and it pays for itself within the month of installation with long-term costs of around 4,000 euros per year, freeing up significantly more capital and leading to much more satisfied customers due to increased delivery readiness.

Thanks to AI, ideal stocks calculated extremely quickly

Thanks to artificial intelligence, the Service Level Booster calculates the ideal stocks extremely quickly and with minimal effort: within 90 seconds, the AI logic determines a new optimum. Traditional calculation methods required hours or even days for equivalent results, depending on complexity. This is neither economical nor practical in daily operations, leading companies to often settle for simpler methods and poorer results.

“The introduction of artificial intelligence in inventory management is a new milestone that can further optimize even automated inventory management systems like our DISKOVER SCO. The benefits are even clearer for companies that have not yet been optimized with our APS system. Here, significantly better results are typically achieved with less planning effort and lower costs, making the Service Level Booster truly worthwhile for any company with a finished goods warehouse of around 500 products. The more complex the product range and the larger the warehouse, the greater the benefit,” explains Professor Dr. Götz Andreas Kemmner from the Abels & Kemmner Group.

Maximizing delivery readiness

The Service Level Booster typically sets finished goods inventories in industrial and trading companies so that minimal stocks are maintained at a specified overall delivery readiness level. Alternatively, the new Service Level Booster can also maximize delivery readiness at a specified inventory value.

“High delivery readiness is central to the competitiveness of trading companies and production warehouses. However, higher delivery capability is usually purchased at disproportionately higher inventory levels, which ties up liquidity and carries the risk of being stuck with unsellable inventory. Supply chain management and sales try to escape this dilemma by aiming for different delivery readiness levels for various product categories. Until now, this was mostly done based on gut feeling and experience, as it is practically impossible to achieve an economical distribution of delivery readiness and inventory across the entire product portfolio with traditional mathematics. Our new Service Level Booster aims to solve this problem in 90 seconds,” emphasizes Dr. Bernd Reineke the advantage of the new Service Level Booster.

Available now

The new Service Level Booster is now available as a service package for a one-time potential test, a one-time optimization of all safety stocks, or as a continuous on-premises service. The launch of a cloud-based web service is planned for 2022. The Service Level Booster is also freely available to all users of the APS and ERP optimization system DISKOVER SCO without additional costs and is now available in all customer systems. The Service Level Booster is based on the optimizer engine of DISKOVER, which SCT has developed with significant effort in recent years and is also used in SCT’s AI-based PP/DS system, first presented in 2020.

About SCT

As not only companies but also their supply chains are in global competition, SCT Supply Chain Technologies GmbH develops software tools and instruments like the APS software DISKOVER SCO that help users optimize their supply chain quickly, efficiently, and sustainably. Over 20 years of experience, a competent development team, and close cooperation with a network of supply chain experts from the fields of (business) engineering, business administration, and computer science from practice and academia within the FIR-Solution-Group ensure the high quality of SCT Supply Chain Technologies’ solutions and ensure that the software is always up to date with the latest technical and business standards.

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