The supply chain execution suite comes of age at RedPrairie

By Staff -- Modern Materials Handling, 6/1/2007

Not that long ago, Tom Kozenski and Erv Bluemner might have met separately with a reporter to talk about their products. Today, Kozenski, RedPrairie's vice president of product marketing for distribution solutions including warehouse management systems (WMS), and Bluemner, the vice president for global transportation management solutions (TMS), are sitting in a room together to talk about RedPrairie's suite of supply chain execution applications.

When Modern published its first story about an integrated transportation and warehouse management solution—or T/WMS—back in June of 2002, the supply chain execution suite was more talk than action. “You were selling to a warehouse manager who didn't have anything to do with transportation, or a transportation manager who wasn't responsible for the warehouse,” Kozenski remembers. “Try to talk about a suite of applications, and most companies just weren't interested.”

Today, adds Bluemner, that has changed. “Instead of a warehouse- or transportation-centric title, we're talking to a vice president of supply chain who has responsibility for it all,” Bluemner says.

The change is a reflection of just how strategic, and complicated, the supply chain has become. “Major retailers are getting a supply of goods from China that are going to be sorted and crossdocked from the port to a regional DC and then flow into the stores,” says Bluemner. “To make that happen, you need tight integration between transportation and warehousing activities.”