Team Up and integrated pharma logistics supply chain culture

By Dale Benton
A major pharm-logistics initiative has been founded and launched in a bid to improve the efficiency and integration of global pharma logistics supply ch...

A major pharm-logistics initiative has been founded and launched in a bid to improve the efficiency and integration of global pharma logistics supply chain.

Team-Up, announced at the IATA AirPharma Conference in Brussels 2016, is an industry driver programme to bring real collaborative working to the pharmaceutical logistics sector.

Here’s what you need to know about Team Up:

Collaboration is key

Team-Up has been established by a cross-section of sector leaders with the main aim of meeting the supply chain challenges posed by today’s rapidly changing market conditions. One way of tackling these challenges is through collaboration across the entire supply chain.

This is where Team-Up comes in.

“TEAM-UP will not only identify and explain the general principles and protocols of collaborative working, it will provide flexible guidance on how these principles can be interpreted and applied in a pharma-logistics context”

There’s value in productivity

Productivity and cost reductions are two major talking points in any industry, particularly the pharma supply chain and logistics industry. It is said that major companies across the $1 trillion industry are spending close to £10bn per year on cold logistics alone.  Team-Up lays out the differences between an integrated network when compared to a traditional supply chain.

Better visibility in end-to-end supply chain, an increase in information transparency, a risk sharing corporate culture, a better more formal risk/change management approach and a philosophy for continuous development are all identified in Team Up’s prospectus as key advantages of an integrated network.

Collaborative goals start with Team-Up

In striving for a more collaborative supply chain, particularly amongst stakeholder sin the pharma and bio-pharma logistics sectors, Team-Up has outlined four main goals:

  1. Realigning the corporate culture of pharma-logistics to better support integrated working
  2. Sharing collaborative best practice and providing the industry with practical advice and tools in order to standardise partnering methodologies and facilitate the assembly of integrated supply networks
  3. Providing shippers and logistics providers with a recognised accreditation status for exemplary collaborative working and to promote these credentials to all sector stakeholders
  4. Strengthening the business case for integrated supply networks by building an evidence-base from pilot programmes and other evaluations

You’re Accreditation to the industry

Team-Up has developed a charter that defines the accreditation as a recognition of outstanding collaborative direction and adherence to established cultural and behavioural standards. The aim of the accreditation is to create a standardised performance measure that can allow peers to recognise an organisation’s commitment, ability and capacity for integrated working.

For a supplier, it’s a sign of a particular shipper using Team Up accredited partners. Not only that, a shipper will use Team Up’s credentials as a necessary or preferred, pre-qualification condition when selection and short listing suppliers.

The power is in the hands of the shippers. And logistics partners.

For Team Up to fully reform the pharma-logistics supply chain culture, it’s going to take the input and dedication from the pharma shipper. For the pharma shipper, it is paramount that it uses its expertise, coercive influence and buying power to promote, facilitate and enable supply chain integration. In essence, by using its unique customer status to exercise sound leadership over its supply chain partners, a shipper holds the key to the doorway to better distribution, cost control, compliancy, safety, visibility and risk control.

Where do we go from here?

Team Up isn’t here to say that integrated working across the pharma logistics industry is non existant, rather it is addressing that the current trend of integrated approach tends to be proprietary in nature, asymmetric in execution, limited in scope and often not much more than lip service in reality.

Shippers are dependent on the knowledge and performance of their logistics partners to maintain the integrity of their sensitive, high-value products. By working in a TEAM-UP climate of collaboration and transparency both shippers and suppliers can open the door to better business, more constructive relationships, clear market differentiation and real competitive advantage.

Don’t just take our word for it….

TEAM-UP founder Alan Kennedy stressed the urgent need for greater integration of the pharma-logistics supply chain: "With the huge challenges it is facing, the pharmaceutical logistics sector faces a very uncertain future unless it is prepared to abandon its traditional silo thinking and practices in favour of a more collaborative approach. The advent of the TEAM-UP integration framework will help accelerate the changes needed and open the doors to faster, more equitable, more systematic supply chain integration. There is no longer any excuse for inertia."

The TEAM-UP programme is scheduled to go live in January 2017 but interested parties are invited to find out more now by downloading the TEAM-UP Prospectus from www.team-up.global

 

Supply Chain Digital's October issue is now live. 

Follow @SupplyChainD on Twitter.

Supply Chain Digital is also on Facebook.

Share

Featured Articles

PwC Examines Digital Trends in Operations for 2024

PwC’s Digital Trends in Operations Survey for 2024 demonstrates a significant proportion of firms are struggling to achieve their desired outcomes

P&SC LIVE New York 2024 Virutal - SAVE THE DATE

Don’t miss out on your chance to attend Procurement & Supply Chain LIVE New York in 2024 Virtually, 5-6 June

Charities & NGOs Submit to The Global P&SC Awards for FREE

The Global Procurement & Supply Chain Awards hosted at P&SC LIVE London Sept 2024 welcomes charities and NGOs to submit for FREE

Procurement & Supply Chain LIVE: 2024 Dates to Remember

Digital Supply Chain

Gartner Unveils Top Supply Chain Technology Trends for 2024

Technology

What the Latest CSDDD Milestone Means for Supply Chains

Sustainability