Upturn in market—tied to more robust solutions—surprises analyst
by Staff -- Manufacturing Business Technology, 11/1/2004 12:00:00 AM
ARC Advisory Group, Dedham, Mass., has found strong growth in the logistics visibility and control (LV&C) market, a component it monitors within the more broadly defined supply chain event management (SCEM) category. Steve Banker, ARC service director for supply chain management, says the historical cumulative average growth rate between 2000-2003 was 29.0 percent, which was, he says, "surprising to me."
"At one time there were more than 20 SCEM start-ups funded by at least $100 million in venture capital [VC]," Banker says. "Most of those companies have disappeared, and VC investments in this area have been a bust. Because of the disappearance of so many of the start-ups, I assumed the market had not seen great growth. While there have been many exits, the market leaders have seen such strong growth in this area."
ARC views LV&C as comprised of several elements for managing supply-side, demand-side, global visibility, and reverse and service logistics. Collectively, these areas are generating considerably more market interest than the warehouse or transportation management segments. Segmentation into separate, functionally focused components has occurred as vendors deliver more robust solutions for decision-support, workflow, and analytic issues. According to ARC, one reason for the growth of LV&C is that the various elements can be tied more logically to one another.
Optum, Yantra, and Viewlocity led in growth in the LV&C market, according to ARC.
