Summary of How Motorola put CPFR into Action Cederlund - Essay Example

Summary of "How Motorola put CPFR into Action Cederlund" Discussed in this paper is a summary of “How Motorola put CPFR into Action Cederlund”. In order to overcome the risk of losing customers to its competitors, Motorola Company decided to launch a Collaborative planning, Replenishment and Forecasting initiative. Before launching this initiative strategy, Motorola decided to determine how many phone handsets were being bought by its retailers in order to make accurate forecasts and boost sales.

This was followed by determining the mechanism of Collaborative Planning, Replenishment and Forecasting. Motorola found out that the ordinary limitation of CPFR launch is over-emphasizing and since streamlined replenishment is the primary goal planning and forecasting is driven by spending the time appropriately. In order to ensure a successful CPFR implementation the core company operations team employed successful implementation prerequisites such as sell-through and inventory to its performance and goals’ plan.

Additionally, all team members had retail customers’ names indicated on their shirts. In order to reach a successful implementation Motorola ensured that it realigned its business strategy. This is because CPFR fundamentally requires business strategy change from a customer transaction related to a collaborative relationship. In order to rationalize the process of planning, replenishment, and forecasting, Cederlund’s group implemented a formal communication channels at several points along with the supply chain.

The Cederlund’s group then assisted in rethinking and redefining the structure of the organization in order to change the structure in a collaborative relationship. One important move that the company made was to form account-based performance teams. Another important move that Motorola made was to tune up Collaborative Information Systems. As a result, Motorola’s relationship with its retailers changed, and in order for the information systems and organizational structure to align with this change, the inter-organizational relationship also changed.

Putting CPFR into action brought significant benefits to both Motorola and its retailers. For instance, the mean absolute percent error (MAPE) is currently a fraction of the previous levels. This also brought quick inventory reductions at the distribution centers since the need for buffering stock reduced. Work citedCederlund, Jerold P; Kohli, Rajiv; Sherer, Susan A; Yao, Yuliang. “How Motorola Put CPFR into Action.” Proquest, 2014.