Fully half of respondents report that they plan to invest in information technology hardware and software in the coming year, and Hill says that the trend is toward a convergence of software such as WMS, warehouse control systems (WCS), and ERP—the enterprise applications in which 25% of respondents are planning to invest. In 2011, just 12% had plans for enterprise applications.

“For more than 20 years, we’ve been talking about trading partner collaboration and the importance of sharing information across trading partners to reduce order cycle times and improve visibility,” says Hill. “People are embracing collaboration not just philosophically, but actually. If that’s true, it suggests we need to make investments in technology and systems that enable real-time information.”

Companies are beginning to recognize that unless they’re able to share information with their trading partners, they’re going to fall behind the curve, says Hill, and they are looking to suppliers to provide everything—WMS, WCS, ERP, customer relationship management, and sales and operations planning—on a single platform.

Respondent demographics
In January, Peerless Research Group e-mailed survey questionnaires to readers of Modern Materials Handling and Logistics Management, yielding 597 qualified respondents from manufacturing (39%), warehousing (21%), corporate (25%) and aligned logistics professionals (15%). Revenues of responding companies range from large (26% have annual revenues of $500 million or more) to small (47% are below $50 million). Qualified respondents are those managers and personnel involved in the purchase decision process of materials handling solutions.

Risk management and “The Sandy Effect”

Being caught unprepared is a risk many can’t afford. But there are also risks few can anticipate.

Last year, 79% of respondents indicated they had a plan for identifying, analyzing and reducing exposures to risk in their materials handling, transportation and logistics operations. This year, 44% responded affirmatively. John Hill, director at St. Onge, suggests the havoc wrought by the storm Sandy on supply chains across the eastern seaboard served as a wake-up call.

“They previously thought they had really good plans to deal with many if not all eventualities,” says Hill. “And then they were hit with a natural sledgehammer that showed them any risk mitigation they had done was futile because it just overwhelmed their plan.”

Hill suggests the 56% of respondents who reported they do not have a risk plan might be in the process of re-evaluating what it means to be prepared for contingencies, whether natural or man-made.

Among the 44% with a plan in place, areas of focus include legal liabilities (59%), in-house production or operations (55%), supplier risks (52%), logistics risks (52%), data breaches (45%), natural disasters (41%), intellectual property theft (40%), and terrorism (27%).