Top 20 SCM Vendors

The leaders in 2008 look much the same as in 2007. Once again, No. 1 SAP with $942 million and No. 2 Oracle with $715 million top the list. In a tough year, both posted significant percentage gains, with SAP up nearly 12% and Oracle growing by nearly 9%. JDA Software with $390 million, Manhattan Associates with $337 million and RedPrairie with $293 million rounded out the top five.

The TMS market was essentially flat, coming in at $1.2 billion, up from $1.1 billion in 2007, according to Adrian Gonzalez, director of the logistics executive council for ARC Research (781-471-1000, www.arcweb.com). The high price of fuel continues to be the most important factor driving the TMS market, according to Gonzalez. "Record oil prices through the first nine months of 2008 helped the market post an overall respectable number for the year."
The WMS market, meanwhile, was also flat, at $1.2 billion, according to Steve Banker, ARC's service director of supply chain management. The most important development in the market may be that big players like RedPrairie, Manhattan Associates and HighJump continue to take market share from the small to mid-sized providers. As Banker looks at the market, he sees as many as 20 small players that are on life support and may not survive in the current economy.

The most significant trend may be the emergence of new models, like on-demand, software-as-a-service, and by-the-transaction subscription models, for delivering and pricing supply chain management solutions. In the TMS market, for instance, the hosted model already represents about one third of the implementations, according to Gonzalez. While it has been slow to expand to the other applications, vendors are experimenting with new models. One idea that is emerging would deliver and price software services based on the number of transactions similar to the way a 3PL charges for order fulfillment services. Both Banker and Jacobson have had conversations with WMS and MES providers that are talking about this concept. Whether it will catch on or not is too early to tell.
"The on-demand market is about 1% of the WMS market," says Banker. "But vendors are looking at ways to reduce the upfront cost of implementing a solution."

Asia Pacific is about 8-12% of the global market and I predict significant change in the make-up of the SCM vendors in Asia Pac in 2009-2011.

The Asia Pacific market for WMS is still over $100M ..

More to follow..

Retailer Transforms Supply Chain With RFID

In a move to RFID-enable its complete supply chain, apparel retailer Charles Vogele has implemented a Merchandise Visibility system that will cover point-of-manufacture to point-of-sale, using standard EPC Gen 2 labels. The system, the first standards-based system to RFID-enable a retailer's entire supply chain, will assist retailers in streamlining their supply chains by applying smart tags to apparel merchandise at point-of-manufacture, and reading the tags in all parts of the logistics operations, including in the store. Retailers will be able to improve operations and increase shelf availability at the store by tracking item-level merchandise throughout the facility. Thomas Beckmann, vice president of supply chain operations at Charles Vogele, notes the firm's "logistical challenge" of dealing with approximately 70 million garments sourced annually from more than 400 suppliers and distributed to 34 consolidation hubs throughout Asia and Europe. "Our adoption of RFID has transformed and improved our operations from source to store," Beckmann says. The Merchandise Visibility system was supplied by Checkpoint Systems.Web Link