What you’ll read

1. Introduction to PIP Packages
2. Available Functionalities
3. Sample Code Mockup: Advanced Center of Gravity
4. Why Use PIP Packages?
5. Useful Links

Introduction to PIP Packages

This portfolio of pip packages provides powerful solutions for enhancing various aspects of your supply chain operations. Whether you’re analyzing routes, optimizing logistics, or using predictive analytics for smarter decision-making, these packages simplify complex tasks and automate time-consuming processes. Before getting started, make sure your environment is set up for the pip packages. Here are the key requirements:

✔ Python 3.10 or later is recommended for optimal performance and compatibility;

✔ PIP (Python Package Manager);

✔ Log-hub API Key;

✔ Supply Chain Apps PRO Subscription.

Available Functionalities

Pyloghub offers a variety of features designed to enhance your supply chain management processes. Below is a brief overview of the available feature categories.

GEO APPS

Unlock best-in-class supply chain mapping with the Geo Apps bundle. This tool makes it easy to create custom, clear maps that visualize your supply chain while enabling global reachability analysis and street-level distance calculations. By mapping your sales areas and customer locations, you gain full visibility and ensure cost-effective planning. Plus, the ability to convert addresses into coordinates and vice versa lays the foundation for successful supply chain projects. With these insights, you can spot inefficiencies and optimize your network, driving smarter decision-making and improved operations.

NETWORK DESIGN

The apps from the Network Design category enable powerful analysis and scenario simulations for cost-optimal network design and goods flow. It helps determine the ideal warehouse locations and ensures efficient product distribution by calculating the closest warehouse to each customer. By using real shipment data, you can reduce transportation costs, improve service quality, and create a cost-efficient flow of goods. With the ability to compare scenarios based on travel times and costs, this tool helps identify network inefficiencies and optimize product flows for a more streamlined supply chain.

TRANSPORT OPTIMIZATION

The apps from the Transport Optimization bundle offer data-driven insights to help you find the best routes and gain a deeper understanding of your shipments. It factors in variables like flexible driving breaks, customer or vehicle time availability, and whether to use your own fleet or third-party logistics (3PLs). This enables you to create timely, cost-effective transportation routes while reducing expenses and improving operational transparency. Additionally, it provides full visibility into your carbon footprint, eliminating manual calculations and simplifying the process of tracking and reducing your environmental impact for more sustainable business practices.

PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS

The Predictive Analytics apps help you stay ahead of shifts in consumer behavior and market conditions by forecasting future demand using historical data. By analyzing demand trends and predicting future SKU needs, you can reduce waste, minimize risks, and make informed strategic decisions. This tool ensures you have the right products available at the right time, reducing stock imbalances and improving customer satisfaction. Better demand forecasting also streamlines inventory management, driving efficiency and enhancing overall operations.

Sample Code: Advanced Center of Gravity

To demonstrate how easily Pyloghub can be integrated into your workflow, here’s a simple mockup using sample data for the Advanced Center of Gravity calculation. With the app, you can determine the optimal location for new warehouses based on customer locations, their demand for specific product groups, and the corresponding supply sources.

With just a few lines of code, you can load the sample data, configure your parameters, and run the optimization, all while optionally saving the scenario to your workspace for further analysis and comparison.

How to Automate Supply Chain Map Updates

The PIP Packages provide effective solutions to streamline and enhance your supply chain operations. Whether you’re optimizing routes, improving distribution center locations, or using predictive analytics for smarter decision-making, these apps simplify complex tasks and automate time-consuming processes. By integrating the Log-hub Supply Chain Apps PIP packages into your existing workflows, you can automate repetitive tasks, reducing manual effort and enhancing efficiency. This allows you to smoothly incorporate our optimization into your daily operations, enabling continuous improvement. Before you dive into the optimization, make sure your environment is ready to use the packages.

Useful Links

1. GitHub Repository
2. API Documentation
3. Supply Chain Apps Pricing

With Log-hub’s Supply Chain Map API, you can gain unprecedented visibility into your supply chain operations. Whether you need to monitor locations, visualize relationships between facilities, track routes, or manage sea routes, our API, combined with KNIME Analytics Platform, offers a powerful solution. This guide will walk you through how to make the most of this technology, even if you’re new to terms like API, KNIME, or data visualization.

What you’ll read

1. Making your Data Work for You with KNIME
2. Exploring Different Visualization Approaches
3. Who benefits from this tool
4. Connecting Your Data Systems for a Complete Picture
5. How to Automate Supply Chain Map Updates
6. Example Workflow in KNIME
7. Integrating with Visualization Tools and other Systems
8. Benefits of Integration
9. Useful Links

What Is the Supply Chain Map API and Why Should You Care?

Let’s start with the basics. An API (short for Application Programming Interface) is a way for different software systems to talk to each other. But you don’t need to worry about the technical details—what’s important is how the Supply Chain Map API can help you. This tool lets you bring together all the different parts of your supply chain, like where your warehouses are located, how products are transported, and where they’re being shipped, into one easy-to-view, interactive map. Imagine being able to see your entire supply chain at a glance!

Making Your Data Work for You with KNIME

KNIME Analytics is a powerful, open-source platform designed for easy and intuitive data analysis, making advanced analytics accessible to everyone. With its user-friendly, drag-and-drop interface, KNIME allows users to build complex workflows without the need for extensive coding knowledge, making it ideal for both beginners and experienced data scientists. KNIME is also completely free, offering a wide range of tools and integrations to support data blending, machine learning, and data visualization, empowering users to make data-driven decisions with ease.

Now, what if you could automatically update this map without having to manually enter new data all the time? That’s where KNIME comes in. KNIME is a software platform that helps automate data processing.

When you connect the Supply Chain Map API with KNIME, you can set up your system to automatically pull in the latest information—like new shipment details or updated inventory levels—and update your map without you lifting a finger. This means you’re always working with the most current data, which is crucial for making informed decisions.

Exploring Different Visualization Approaches

The Supply Chain Map offers four main visualization approaches:

1. Locations: Displays the geographical positions of various supply chain entities, such as warehouses or distribution centers.

2. Relations: Visualizes connections between two or more locations, helping you understand the flow of goods or information between them.

3. Routes: Focuses on the visualization of transportation paths.

✔ Street Routes: Provides a detailed view of road networks used for transporting goods by delivery trucks or other road-based vehicles.

✔ Aerial Routes: Visualizes air transport paths, allowing you to track the movement of goods via planes.

✔ Sea Routes: Specialized visualization of sea lanes used in maritime shipping, offering insights into shipping routes and maritime logistics.

4. Sea Routes: Specialized visualization of sea lanes used in maritime shipping.

Figure 1. Supply Chain Map Germany

Who benefits from this tool?

This tool is particularly useful for anyone involved in managing supply chains:

✔ Supply Chain Managers can monitor and optimize their operations, making smarter decisions about inventory and transportation.

✔ Logistics Coordinators can track shipments and plan the best routes to ensure timely deliveries.

✔ Data Analysts can dig into the data to uncover insights that lead to better strategies.

Whether you’re preparing for a busy season or dealing with unexpected disruptions, the Supply Chain Map API helps ensure everything runs smoothly.

Connecting Your Data Systems for a Complete Picture

To get the most out of the Supply Chain Map API, it’s important to connect it with the right data sources. These might include:

✔ ERP SYSTEMS: Provide location data, inventory levels, and shipping information.

✔ TMS (Transportation Management Systems): Offer route data, delivery schedules, and carrier performance metrics.

✔ WMS (Warehouse Management Systems): Supply information about stock locations and order fulfillment.

✔ IoT DEVICES: Feed real-time tracking data, such as shipment status and environmental conditions.

✔ EXTERNAL DATA SOURCES: Include weather data, traffic reports, and geopolitical events that could impact routes or operations.

✔ SALES AND CRM SYSTEMS: Align your supply chain activities with customer demand and sales trends.

Figure 2. Connecting data sources in KNIME

How to Automate Supply Chain Map Updates

Keeping your Supply Chain Map up to date is crucial for real-time decision-making. Here’s how you can automate this process:

1. Schedule Data Imports: Set up automated schedules in KNIME to regularly import data from your connected systems.

2. Process Data: KNIME workflows can clean, transform, and analyze the imported data, applying any necessary filters or calculations.

3. Update the Map: The processed data is then sent to the Supply Chain Map API, which updates the map accordingly.

This automation minimizes manual data entry and ensures that your map is always current and accurate.

Example Workflow in KNIME

Figure 3. Example workflow in KNIME Analytics

Bringing your data to Life with Visualization Tools

Once your data is updated, you might want to share it with others. Tools like Power BI and Tableau make this easy by allowing you to create interactive dashboards and reports. These visualizations help you clearly communicate key insights and trends to your team, making sure everyone is on the same page.

To visualize your supply chain map using Power BI:

Figure 4. Export data from KNIME

IMPORT INTO POWER-BI: Load the data into Power BI, where you can create dashboards and reports.

Figure 6. PowerBI Visualization tools

Integrating your Map into other Systems

To extend the utility of your Supply Chain Map, you can integrate it into other systems:

1. API Integration: Use APIs to connect the visualizations with your ERP, CRM, or other enterprise systems, ensuring that everyone in your organization has access to the most current data.

2. Share Reports: Distribute Power BI dashboards or Tableau reports via email, cloud storage, or directly within your organization’s intranet.

Benefits of Integration

Integrating the Supply Chain Map API into your existing operations brings several key benefits:

✔ Efficiency: Automation saves time and reduces the need for manual updates.

✔ Better Decision-Making: Having the latest data at your fingertips means you can make smarter, more informed decisions.

✔ Collaboration: Easy-to-understand visualizations help everyone on your team stay informed and work together more effectively.

✔ Proactive Management: Real-time data allows you to address potential issues before they become problems.

In conclusion, the new Supply Chain Map API from Log-hub 4.3, when combined with the power of KNIME, offers a streamlined, automated solution for keeping your supply chain data accurate, up-to-date, and easy to visualize. Whether you’re managing day-to-day operations or making strategic decisions, this tool can help you optimize your supply chain and stay ahead of the curve.

Useful Links

1. Our KNIME Hub
2. Customized KNIME Solutions by Log-hub
3. API Documentation
4. Github Documentation
5. Our YouTube Channel
6. KNIME Learning Center

Is your gut feeling telling you ‘’My Supply Chain network fulfills customer demand, but, what-if…?’’

You are positive your company’s network design requires some restructuring, but you don’t have the assets to convince the rest of the team? We got you! Scenario Comparison in Supply Chain isn’t only a time and cost saver, but also a great way to support your intuition.

What to expect from Supply Chain Scenario Comparison?

Analyzing different Supply Chain Scenarios offers a systematic method for supply chain analysts and planners to navigate the intricacies of geopolitical tensions, material availability, pricing fluctuations, decisions regarding manufacturing locations, changing retail and distribution strategies, and considerations related to environmental, social, and governance factors. This approach will help you recognize disruptions, risks, and challenges that could influence your company’s Supply Chain.

Disruption happens, and being well-prepared is key. Your most valuable tool in such situations is making decisions based on data. It involves collecting up-to-date information, analyzing it, predicting future risks and disruptions, and simulating potential scenarios. Did you know that the impact of data-driven decision-making is significantly amplified when disruptions occur?

Leveraging data-driven decision-making has the potential to yield improvements of up to 10% in conditions characterized by disruptions.

Optimizing Network Design – where to start?

When it comes to network design optimization, you might want to run AS-IS Analysis, design a completely new network from scratch, optimize an existing network, or compare future strategies. Though it doesn’t include detailed information such as the costs, or number of shipments, a perfect starting point for each of these cases is the Center of Gravity Analysis. It is indeed a simple analysis if you have the right tool.

Center of Gravity vs. Center of Gravity Plus vs. Fixed CoG?

_____

What’s the difference?

Did you choose your Center of Gravity tool? Great! Does the optimization process end here? You can try, but probably not. You want to continue with a more sophisticated analysis, including various variables and constraints.

How to use Network Design Scenario Comparison?

The Network Design App and Network Design Plus App incorporate factors like vehicle capacities, shipment numbers, costs, and factory locations. In these apps, you’ll input information about your factories, customers, and potential warehouses. By considering your input, along with specifying the minimum and maximum number of warehouses you aim to find, the tool will determine the best number and locations for your distribution centers. However, you might be wondering how to accurately decide the number of potential warehouses to include in the Warehouse Table of the Network Design App.

To get a rough idea about the location of your distribution centers, run the Center of Gravity Analysis. Visualize the results, and if needed, filter them out to exclude the warehouses placed in unreachable, or restricted areas. Once you’ve crafted the list of potential warehouses, just insert them into the Network Design App. Here, you will be determining the minimum and maximum warehouse number you want to have in your final solution.

If you’re curious about the impact of including a different number of warehouses in the solution and how it affects costs, that’s where the Scenario Comparison feature comes in. Activate the Save in Platform feature, run as many scenarios as you’d like, and adjust input data based on your specific needs. Save your scenarios on the Log-hub platform with a custom Workspace, including input data, results, a customizable map, and a KPI dashboard immediately after calculation.

On the platform, you can generate a scenario comparison with all your saved scenarios, allowing you to compare their elements side by side. Armed with data-backed insights, you’re now prepared to revolutionize your approach to Network Design. Consider optimizing transportation, leveraging the Scenario Comparison feature available in our Transport Category as well. Explore our Playbook titled “How to Handle Rising Transportation Costs?” for guidance on effectively integrating network design and transportation optimization for optimal results.

Going beyond limits

Scenario Comparison is a perfect tool to simulate and compare different strategies. But, the market can sometimes be… well, let’s say stubborn and unpredictable. Optimizing a multilevel network may involve planning for growth in different markets or regions, or simulating risks in your supply chain. For handling such complex projects, consider exploring our Network Design Simulator. It allows you to incorporate even more data into the calculation.

5 Main Benefits of Scenario Comparison in Network Design

In the ever-changing world of supply chain management, weaving together network design and scenario comparison becomes a crucial guide for businesses, offering a practical toolkit to navigate uncertainties and fine-tune operations. As we explore this integration, picture it as a proactive strategy – one that not only spots potential risks and disruptions but also evaluates adaptability and aids in thoughtful decision-making. Now, let’s delve into the concrete outcomes that await, providing practical insights to fortify your supply chain against the unexpected and enhance your decision-making capabilities.

DISRUPTION ANALYSIS

Assess and analyze potential network design disruptions, and develop robust contingency plans.

COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS

Conduct a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis of different network design scenarios, aiding in the selection of the most cost-effective and efficient options.

This represents just a single facet of supply chain optimization, yet it serves as a solid foundation, wouldn’t you agree? If you’re keen on exploring further opportunities in routing optimization, shipment performance, pattern analysis, network design, demand forecasting, or inventory management, delve into our comprehensive Supply Chain Apps portfolio.

Our Team is always open to providing you with a custom demo, covering the topics you wish, and showcasing the possibilities of our solutions based on your use case. Here is where you can book a call with us.

We won’t fool you – it’s not easy. But since you’re here, this must be the question you are asking yourself, and we’ll try to dig deep into the topic, helping you overcome the transportation costs obstacles. We witnessed a significant increase in the transportation costs. Some of the main reasons for this are the shortage of drivers and vehicles, rising costs of fuel, and regulatory changes.

To jump straight to the point, some basic strategies for handling rising transportation costs, which we’ll cover in this Playbook, are related to optimal network design and route optimization.

There’s no room or time left to wonder why transportation costs are exceeding limits, or if they’ll stabilize. Instead, let’s prepare for market dynamics and uncertainty. To make the process easier for you, we’re explaining the best practices for managing escalating transportation costs with Log-hub solutions. If you serve numerous clients across diverse geographical locations, it’s crucial to ensure proximity to them. This not only builds trust and loyalty but also ensures timely or early deliveries. Therefore, having sufficient warehouses near your key customers is essential. Optimizing the location and number of warehouses is a great start, but not enough for complete optimization. The second phase of this process should be route optimization. So let’s dive in, and figure out how to do it with Log-hub’s solutions.

Handling rising transportation costs with Network Design Optimization Apps

Within the Network Design App, we focus on optimizing the outbound process. In the input data, you’ll encounter three tables: factories, warehouses, and customers. We presume you’re familiar with the locations of your customers and factories, considering factories as your sources or suppliers. The app provides a cost-optimal solution, emphasizing cost-based optimization for outbound activities. While the focus is on outbound optimization, the solver also manages factory assignments, ensuring the correct ones are incorporated into the solution.

While mathematics is powerful, it may not always align with real-world scenarios. If you have business-specific constraints and need to ensure a particular customer is supplied through a specific warehouse or factory, you can directly configure this in the app. Additionally, if desired, within the warehouse list, you have the option to fix certain warehouses, ensuring their inclusion in the solution. Whether specifying customer assignments for a particular warehouse or allowing the solver to handle the assignment, the flexibility is yours.

A Network Design case can vary depending on the business maturity level or other factors. You might want a complete redesign or to start from scratch. Alternatively, you may simply aim to assess if your current situation (AS-IS) is optimal or compare various scenarios to identify the best one. To delve deeper into this, if you’re interested in utilizing Network Design Apps alongside our Center of Gravity Apps and the Scenario Comparison feature, refer to our Playbook titled ”Why is Scenario Comparison in Network Design the key to success?“

To summarize, here’s the data required for the Network Design App:

• Your Factories: Provide their locations, costs, and truck capacities.
• List of Potential Warehouses: Include locations, capacities, costs, and indicate if a warehouse can be fixed in the solution.
• List of Customers: Specify the weight for distribution, number of shipments, the specific warehouse/factory for supply (if desired), and a maximum distance from a warehouse (optional to leave empty).

To tailor the calculation to your needs, use the parameters section to specify whether the calculation should be done at the street level, the preferred distance unit, and whether to activate our Save in Platform and Scenario Comparison feature. Additionally, define the minimum and maximum number of warehouses you seek. If you prefer the solver to have complete freedom for optimization, remove any fixed warehouses and specified assignments, allowing the number of warehouses to align with the facilities listed in the warehouse’s table.

And what are the outcomes?

Keep up the cost optimization with Transport Optimization Apps

Determining the optimality of transportation is straightforward with our Transportation Optimization category. Optimization can be performed based on costs using the Transport Optimization App and Milkrun Optimization App, or based on time using the Transport Optimization Plus App and Milkrun Optimization Plus App. Let’s swiftly go through the Transport Optimization App.

Begin by listing all your locations, including pickup/delivery points or depots. Next, specify your vehicles, detailing their speed, capacity, and costs. When listing shipments, define from-to relations, including customer availability time windows. Optionally, specify the vehicle for a particular pickup or delivery. Utilize the warehouse-customer and factory-warehouse relations from the Network Design optimization in the shipments table. Configure parameters run the calculation, and voilà—your optimal routes, presented through a fully customizable map and essential KPIs on a dashboard.

You can as well analyze your AS-IS situation and current routes, to calculate complete cost savings after both Network Design and Transport optimization.

Besides getting cost-optimal routes and ensuring timely deliveries, you are getting a detailed overview of your transportation plan. You can analyze the total costs and distance of each route, weight, and driving duration. The tool will inform you if it is more cost-efficient for you to outsource some of the shipments, in the Dropped Shipments Table.

The outcomes

Some of the outcomes you can expect after the implementation of the described process are the following:

ANALYSIS OF THE MOST IMPORTANT KPIs, LEADING YOU TO OPTIMAL STRATEGIES

This represents just a single facet of supply chain optimization, yet it serves as a solid foundation, wouldn’t you agree? If you’re keen on exploring further opportunities in routing optimization, shipment performance, pattern analysis, network design, demand forecasting, or inventory management, delve into our comprehensive Supply Chain Apps portfolio.

Our Team is always open to providing you with a custom demo, covering the topics you wish, and showcasing the possibilities of our solutions based on your use case. Here is where you can book a call with us.