Dec 13, 2022|
JD.com Enters the 2023 Finalist of Gartner Power of the Profession Supply Chain Awards
by Yuchuan Wang
JD.com was selected as a finalist for Process or Technology Innovation of the Year by Gartner Power of the Profession™ Supply Chain Awards 2023, for its explainable and intelligent forecasting technology. Among the other finalists are AB InBev, Microsoft Corporation, MTN Group and Schneider Electric.
Forecasting is essential to supply chain planning for any sales team, which helps solve problems including inventory backlog, backorders and more. As a retailer with over 580 million active customers, JD.com’s smart supply chain manages over ten million SKUs a day across China nationwide, and is influenced by multiple factors such as promotions, marketing campaigns, holidays, weather, seasons and more. Under these circumstances, sales people should fully understand the forecasting results and the impact of each factor to make better supply chain decisions.
JD’s forecasting technology combines explainable AI technology with forecasting algorithms that provide visibility of forecasting components and drivers. With the new technology, the forecasting result is no longer just a number, now comprising considerable information about the factors driving the result. For example, during a big promotion, the forecasting system can clearly show the sales breakdown driven by the promotion, so that business teams can better understand the forecasting logic for better inventory preparation.
“In this way, the forecasting system becomes a white box, and is no longer a ‘stranger’ to business teams, but a trusted ‘assistant’ that helps them provide accurate insights for future planning and improve their working efficiency,” said Curtis Liu, vice president of JD.com and head of JD-Y.
So far, the technology has been applied to millions of SKUs on JD.com, and is available for best-selling, long-tail, seasonal and a lot more supplying scenarios. As of September 30, 2022, JD.com’s turnover days were only 31.7, a leading performance compared with peers at its same scale.