In the current issue of Supply and Demand Chain Executive (www.sdcexec.com), Andrew K. Reese, editor, writes…

Which is why Michael Mayoras, CEO of supply chain provider RedPrairie (www.redprairie.com), is excited about a recent trend that he has been seeing in his customer base, which includes retailers, consumer products manufacturers and distributors. They are moving to put in place processes and systems that would more closely link events "on the ground" in the retail center to what is taking place in real time back on the manufacturing shop floor. "Manufacturers are looking to understand what's happening now at the retail point of sale and then adjust their supply chains accordingly," Mayoras says.

Ten years ago, he continues, supply chain wasn't necessarily a part of that kind of conversation at a manufacturer. Marketing and merchandizing decisions remained siloed on the sales and marketing side of the business, while supply chain was left to handle the execution side. "There's more recognition now that supply chain has a very tight tie to how products are arranged and moved on the shelf," Mayoras says, "so supply chain is in the middle of all those conversations." Furthermore, companies are trying to figure out how to use their supply chain application assets to tie point-of-sale intelligence back to the plant so that they can better allocate the right mix of resources in a given shift, based on a given forecast or demand signal, and do that more accurately and more quickly than in the past.

Hmm...does that sound like Flowcasting, or what?