Changes in information and communications technology, international trade liberalization and advances in transportation have enabled the rapid spread of the supply and distribution networks of businesses out of local and national constraints and onto a global stage. This has dramatic implications for all businesses and not just for the large multinational corporations with their global operations dispersed across the world.

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The recent announcement of Tesla’s new power storage systems got me thinking about the relationship between light, productivity, sustainability and the economy.The story of artificial light is a story of economic development. Before oil lamps and candles, people used to go to bed at sundown and slept in ‘two phases’ – first and second sleep. However, with the advent of artificial light, productivity patterns changed along with sleep patterns, as people’s activities became independent of the availability of natural light.

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Milk production has been growing steadily in the developed world. In the developing world there has been some whooping increase both in the consumption and production of dairy products. Of particular interest is the infant formula, which has been a commonplace in the west, yet a prized possession in some parts of Asia : people actually lock up trusted foreign brands in safes. India alone has been the largest milk producer accounting for 16% of global production and China is the fourth largest consumer (5 billion Euros worth imported in 2013). Even though the South Asian Region is progressing in milk production, it appears to lag behind in processing, especially Infant Formula.

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What is the most valuable and precious commodity in the world? Oil? Gold? Saffron? Or perhaps some rare Earth metal? The correct answer is; none of the above. The most valuable and precious commodity in the world is trust. An abundance of trust lubricates and accelerates positive endeavour in business, politics and personal relationships. In extreme cases the absence of trust leads to war, pestilence and famine. Even in the best case the absence of trust acts as a brake imposing costs and delay on progress in any enterprise.

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INTRODUCTION

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen.

Over the last 15 years or so I have had the, dubious privilege and opportunity to look deeply into the inner workings of up to a 100 warehouses all over the world – here at home in Ireland, in Britain, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and North and South America.

60 to 70 per cent of these warehouses have been in manufacturing industry –in sectors such as pharmaceuticals, medical devices, food, beverage and industrial equipment. While all warehouse facilities that support manufacturing operations have fundamentally the same processes, one of the things that has struck me most on my travels is the divergence of standards, practices and performance across these different facilities. There is a big gap between the best-in-class and the also-rans.

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At the World Economic Forum in Davos last week, the conversation revolved around innovation and volatility; amongst other pressing issues such as economic and gender inequality, sustainability, education and meaningful leadership.

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Businesses, both small and big, have a lot of data associated with many aspects of the operation. Inefficient data management practices lags business growth due to unreliable data being provided thus limiting its potential to make key decisions based on insights and anticipate any future changes.  Data management has evolved to being one of the key management aspects of any business. In a business, data changes over time: acquisitions and corrections are being made in multiple entry points for products, customers, employees, vendors, and so on. Master data management (MDM) stores all the data in a single system and synchronizes data acquisitioned from several source systems and provides most accurate, timely and relevant version of truth about essential business entities.

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Problem-solving and innovation are two essential business processes that we need to master in order to thrive and prosper in the face of the many and varied challenges that we face.
The trouble is that while both processes are necessary, if we spend too much time fixing problems around the place we leave too little time for thinking about how we are going to do things better in future.

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21st Century Warehousing: Strategy and Operation

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