A New Approach to Manufacturing Supply Chain Risk Management

In this project we plan to devise a completely new way of managing risk in Supply Chains, supported by independent technology that allows very safe assurance and risk data sharing controlled by each participant in the Supply Chain. We will exploit this new methodology and data sharing mechanisms in our Third Party Risk Management software product, Rizikon Assurance, and will use the new thinking to treble our market share and generate significant new revenues.

Suppliers have long been a huge source of risk for manufacturers of all types. With the business disruption caused by Covid-19, and new trade rules and tariffs being negotiated on an unprecedented scale, this risk is only increasing, possibly rapidly.

At the same time, very few manufacturers successfully manage risk in their Supply Chains. In conversations with over 100 Senior Procurement and Supplier Management Managers, we have not encountered a single organisation satisfied with their visibility and management of Supply Chain Risk. Most do not know many of their suppliers past Tier One, except possibly on a small number of goods with mandatory or scarcity-driven traceability.

This is because Tier One suppliers are generally unwilling or unable to share risk information about their sub-suppliers because of confidentiality, or competitive reasons. It can also be because there are no standard methods or technical standards that support sharing of Supplier Risk and Assurance information. There may well be many other reasons, which we intend to explore.

We will carry out research to find out what is stopping organisations fully manage Supply Chain Risk. We will then propose new methods of identifying, visualising and managing Supply Chain Risk, data transfer standards and data sharing platforms to address this critical, systemic problem.

The main deliverables we will publish along with our partners at Liverpool John Moores University for all in the Supply Chain Risk industry and wider UK economy to benefit from.