Monsanto Digital Transformation Initiatives

About the Customer

Headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri, United States, Monsanto is a global modern agricultural company and operates in multiple facilities in more than 70 countries worldwide where physical movement of goods takes place. Its sustainable agriculture products include seeds, plant biotechnology traits and crop protection chemicals. The company has over 30 brands aimed at helping farmers produce the food, feed, fiber, and fuel they need while using natural resources more efficiently.

Scope and Challenges

As Monsanto serves the agricultural market, seasonality plays a crucial factor in supply chain and logistics operations. Logistics processes require responsiveness to meet time-sensitive customer demands while this pressure is exacerbated by Monsanto’s continuing volume growth in its global markets. Road transportation is a significant contributor to operational complexity considering the company’s current go-to-market strategy of producing and supplying products locally within row crops, their largest business segment.

As the digital transformation continues across the supply chain, sustainable agriculture company Monsanto identified a need to standardize end-to-end transportation processes globally to drive future customer interactions and improve customer experiences, while meeting their ever-changing needs and expectations. In 2015, Monsanto selected JDA Software, Inc. as its partner to help realize its multiyear vision for its logistics organization.

Outcome and Implications

As a result, Monsanto has completed an impressive three-year journey to deploy the full scope of JDA Transportation Management solutions across transportation procurement, planning and execution, advanced analytics, and mobility. JDA Transportation Management standardizes end-to-end transportation processes across all the company’s regions, leading to data driven decision-making while improving the visibility in logistics operations. Due to its impressive deployment success, Frost & Sullivan has awarded Monsanto with a 2018 Manufacturing Leadership award which recognizes an elite group of leaders who are shaping the future of global manufacturing.

The JDA Transportation Management platform has helped Monsanto optimize costs via route consolidation, load optimization, and industry-leading practices in supplier bidding and carrier contract management. Advanced technologies allow Monsanto planners to leverage new capabilities in mobility, data tracking and geo-mapping — increasing their ability to make real-time decisions that maximize responsiveness across 353 facilities in 69 countries. Monsanto has also improved asset utilization by seven percent by maximizing truck capacity – eliminating 1.4 million miles traveled by vehicles in Brazil alone, and reducing the company’s carbon footprint around the globe. The JDA platform also provides a common architecture for all Monsanto’s global shipments. Looking forward, Monsanto has begun to enable real-time visibility of customer shipments into their Customer Service platforms. JDA also provides a foundation to execute a long-term vision of providing differentiated services across a variety of customer segments.

Quotes

“Delivery experience is a key influencer to the overall customer service rating. As the transportation and logistics industry continues to transform, in tandem with sales volume growth in certain regions, we need to make sure we are supporting that growth with improved responsiveness, while remaining efficient.” “By integrating JDA Transportation Management with track and trace platforms, Monsanto’s ability to serve our customers improved through the increased visibility into our transportation decisions. Overall, our supply chain strategy empowers our employees to act with speed and agility in making logistics and transportation decisions — while also guaranteeing that everyone is acting in the best financial interests of our company, based on a shared set of values and priorities.” – said Prasad Juvekar, Global Logistics Lead at Monsanto