With leading positions in lithium, bromine, and refining catalysts, global specialty chemicals company and SAP customer Albemarle Corporation powers the potential of companies in many of the world’s largest and most critical industries, from energy and communications to transportation and electronics.
Albemarle CIO Patrick Thompson discusses what it’s like to support customers “creating disruptive innovation,” the digital supply chain and data-driven transformation with CXO Talk’s Michael Krigsman.
On the customer experience and the digital supply chain:
“Not only are we going through a transformation with [SAP] S4/HANA and SAP, but we’re also bringing client track and trace capabilities, where a client could go into a portal and kind of see where their delivery of their products are. That’s part of our digital transformation strategy, and that’s just one solution we’re trying to put together for our customers…. Client track and trace [is] a portal that customers could go in and look at the products we’re shipping to them at different stages in the lifecycle of delivery. That’s a digital experience. They can get that on their phone; they can get that at their desk; they can get that while they’re mobile. That’s one digital experience.”
On the role of IT and supply chain visibility:
“IT has become an enabler not only to deliver information to our clients, but also to run our plants at maximum capacity by tying operational technology in with IT to bring visibility to where the plant needs to be maintained or maintenance needs to be applied before the plant shuts down to keep the plant running as close to 100 percent as possible… The customers today, it’s a highly competitive market so, if you can give them better information [for] their business planning projections and meet their manufacturing delivery times, you’re going to, one, retain customers but, two, you’re probably going to attract some customers that are interested in that kind of visibility.”
Why “data is the new oil”:
“Some of the new technologies like SAP S/4HANA now allow you to go against the source of the transactions without building a middle layer, which has been very costly, very expensive, and not always reliable from an integrity perspective.”
Watch the video above to learn more about Albemarle and how they are working with innovative companies and driving their digital transformation.
