Resilinc has published its 2015 supply chain events annual report which summarizes and analyzes nearly 750 unique supply chain alerts and notifications generated by the EventWatch® 24×7 global event monitoring, alert, and analysis service in 2015. 2015 saw a high-level of disruptive supply chain event activity as several significant events occurred throughout the year, from the major chemical explosions at the Port of Tianjin to numerous chart-topping typhoons in the critical Asia-Pacific region and the arrival of El Nino in the latter half of the year. Evident in the report, numerous geo-political, macro-economic, social/technology and environmental trends continue to impact global supply chain continuity.
The annual report analyzes global supply chain incidents and trends according to risk type, industry, geography, severity, and seasonality, comparing 2015 data in these categories with 2013 and 2014. The report also includes the EventWatch Top 5™ Supply Chain Events for 2015, a key takeaway for supply chain practitioners. In this post, we provide an overview of the report; however, for a closer look at our data graphs, trend charts and analyses, check out the full EventWatch Annual Report.
Top 5 Supply Chain Events of 2015
A key takeaway from the annual report is the EventWatch Top 5™ supply chain events of 2015. The top 5 events ranking is driven by the estimated aggregate revenue impact from the highest-impact events reported by EventWatch throughout the year. The estimated revenue impact is calculated by leveraging Resilinc’s database of over 80,000 suppliers and approximately 1.5 million parts which are tracked by Resilinc’s cloud supplier intelligence repository.
The top 5 supply chain disruption events are listed below. Included in the annual report are estimates of the top 5 events’ revenue impact, average site time-to-recovery (TTR), and number of sites affected:
- Typhoon Soudelor – Taiwan, China, Philippines
- Typhoon Dujuan – Taiwan, China, and the Philippines
- Chemical explosions at the Port of Tianjin, China
- Typhoon Mujigae – China, Vietnam, Philippines
- Typhoon Goni – Taiwan, China, Japan, Korea, Philippines.
Key Report Highlights
- Event Type: For a third year in a row, factory fires/explosions were the most commonly reported supply chain disruption event and represented 17% of total EventWatch bulletins in 2015.
- Industry: From 2013 to 2015, the automotive industry was the most frequently impacted industry, but a narrow margin over the reported incidents that impacted the high tech and life sciences industries.
- Geography: In 2015, the majority of supply chain events reported by EventWatch emanated from Asia, followed closely by North America. However, in 2014, North America produced the lion’s share of supply chain events reported by EventWatch.
- Seasonality: In 2015, the three most impactful months to global supply chains were December, August, and September/March (tied). December was characterized by an unusual increase in factory fires/explosions, the impact of El Nino (which peaks during winter time), and increased merger and acquisition activity toward the end of the calendar year. August had a rare spike in activity due to the devastating Tianjin explosions and their subsequent disruptions.
- Event Severity: Medium potential for disruption events were most common in 2015 and comprised 52% of all EventWatch bulletins, consistent with current supply chain impact research that suggests smaller, more frequent disruptions can be more costly in aggregate than those caused by high-impact, infrequent events. In 2015, medium and low-impact events represented around 90% of Eventwatch bulletins.
While these are only highlights of the report, please check out the full report for trends charts and analyses, data graphs, and a deeper discussion of supply chain risk in 2015.
About the EventWatch Annual Report
For those unfamiliar, the EventWatch Annual Report aggregates, analyzes, and summarizes supply chain event information generated by the EventWatch service. The EventWatch Annual Report helps supply chain risk practitioners, analysts, and executive stakeholders understand global supply chain risk trends through various lenses, answering questions like: Which event types are most common or becoming more common? How does my industry compare to other industries in terms of the number of events experienced? Which regions are impacted the most? What months see the most supply chain disruptions?
Compared to other “Top 10 Supply Chain Event” lists, the Eventwatch Annual Report is uniquely driven by data and focuses on upstream impacts to specific brands, suppliers, sites, and parts, based on calculated value-at-risk. Resilinc’s rapidly expanding supplier repository contains risk information associated with over 80,000 suppliers and 1.5 million parts, and already on-boarded suppliers represent up to 90% of a company’s upstream supply chain. This is in contrast with other publications that provide more qualitative assessments based typically on estimates of damage to public or shared infrastructure, which invariably steers the focus toward downstream/logistics-related disruptions.
