The power of proximity (again!)
The supply chain of the future will put products and services closer to the source of demand—but only if innovators embrace a revolutionary mindset.
I accidentally released this edition without its embedded video, so I am sending again. Apologies.
I am very excited to announce that Robert C. Wolcott and Kaihan Krippendorff’s new book, “Proximity: How Coming Breakthroughs in Just-in-Time Transform Business, Society, and Daily Life,” is now available for pre order. From my perspective, Proximity is a revolutionary North Star for guiding supply chain innovations that focus not on improving current business models but, instead, reinventing them. More on that below, but if you are looking for a primer, please read this edition or this one, or listen to Wolcott here. I will soon announce something new: an NAW Visionaries Webinar featuring a live discussion with Wolcott moderated by NAW’s Chief Innovation Officer, Bart Tessel. But for now, I offer a brief introduction to Proximity and my ideas on its implications for distribution’s innovators and the future of the supply chain.
Consider the possibilities
Listening to Wolcott at TWIN Global 2023, I learned that Proximity involves using digital technologies to push the production and delivery of value ever closer to the moment of demand. Proximity will reshape every industry by reinventing every product, service, and customer experience and reshaping the supply chain that delivers them. Every industry will still produce mass-scale products, but new, locally defined businesses will evolve, producing customized value at lesser scales with competitive costs. Proximity means that every innovator must consider what happens when we can have anything anywhere, anytime—and what happens to us as humans, communities, and societies.
Bold words, to be sure. In my video below, I offer several examples of how Proximity is all around us, already driving change, and suggest several new implications for distribution’s innovators. I offer possibilities, not answers. My goal is to kick-start a conversation among distribution’s innovators and to encourage you to pre order your copy of Proximity.
Let’s jump-start radical collaborations
Let’s work on making Proximity the most amazing and consequential North Star for creating breakthrough distribution and supply chain innovations. To get started, share your comments and questions below or email me at mark.dancer@n4bi.com. We are at the very beginning of a supply chain revolution, and I plan to devote many editions in the coming year to sharing new ideas and exploring what is needed to make them happen. Let’s get going. Now.