The annual Odette conference and exhibition
held in Lyon, France on 23-24th May was hailed a success by
exhibitors and delegates alike.
It was simply summed up by Pascal Born, Global Supply Chain
Solutions Director at Caterpillar Logistics who said afterwards..…”Many good subjects
and presentations and great opportunities for networking and exchanging with
others from similar industries with similar challenges”. Over 250 participants from 125 companies and 17 countries
attended the event, which took place over two days and
included more than 40 speakers covering a
range of key strategic and operational supply chain topics. Despite the supply
crisis in the automotive industry caused by the earthquake and tsunami in Japan
just weeks before, the turnout more than equalled that of 2010.
The Odette Conference is a ‘must-see’ event for automotive supply
chain professionals, showcasing recent Odette activities, as well as providing
an opportunity for companies to share and discuss their supply chain and B2B
communications experiences. And of course, it is a tremendous networking opportunity
for all to catch up with friends old and new.
We were delighted to have
Mr Christian Mardrus, Managing Director of the Renault-Nissan
Global Alliance as our keynote speaker, along with other
senior industry executives giving their strategic visions
in the opening Plenary sessions on both days.
Alongside the two main operational streams
we included a special briefing to industry of the proposed
Central Automotive Supplier Database service (CASD),
which Odette is proposing to host for the European automotive
suppliers and OEMs, if the forthcoming pilot is successful.
The
B2B communications session was extremely popular and
the new OFTP2 file
transfer protocol was a major discussion topic. |
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The roll-out experiences
of companies such as Volvo, Johnson Controls and Hella were
shared, along with a preview of the shortly to be published
report entitled ‘Comparison of File Transfer Alternatives
for B2B data exchanges’. This report provides guidance
for companies considering future communications options; whether
they prefer the widely available Public Internet, or a dedicated
private network like ENX.
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The quality of demand forecasting
has long been a concern and there was a very interesting
session with contributions from BMW, Renault, SKF and
PSA took place. They highlighted the various activities
in several national projects, which will be brought together
as one Odette European recommendation over the next 12
months.
Russia was very much on the
agenda again as one of the most important new territories
for the industry. |
Avtovaz,
PSA
and Grupo Antolin presented their plans for growth as
well as their
challenges ahead in this rapidly developing market…Odette
is planning to establish a local membership in Russia
to help support our members.
Truck manufacturers and logistics service providers were
more to the fore this year, adding an interesting balance
to the
more usual contributions from passenger car manufacturers
and suppliers.
Service providers are also, of course, an important part
of our industry and their participation is an essential
part of
the Odette Conference. This year’s exhibition included
an interesting mix of companies, seven of which were with us
for the first time. The main sponsors this year were Axway and Sterling
Commerce to whom we are very grateful indeed. The Rhones-Alpes automotive cluster gave its own support
to the event and arranged for us to hold the evening
event in
the historic 18th century Hotel de Ville, which is
only open to the public once a year.
I would like to add my personal thanks to all those
who attended Odette2011, the sponsors, exhibitors,
speakers
and everyone
who helped behind the scenes to make the event such
a success.
Planning has now
started for Odette2012, which will take place in Berlin
towards the end of the year
and more details
will
be released in due course.
In the meantime,
we are busy working on the future strategic direction
for Odette and one significant
input into this
will come from our Supply Chain Executives Workshop
in on
13th October. The outcomes from this workshop will
help shape our key projects and activities for
the next 3
to 5 years.
We will report further on this in future editions
of Outlook.
Best wishes
John Canvin
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