Forecasting
Reflex Demand Planning breaks new ground. It has unique features that allow you to create real value for your customers, and take real cost out of your business. Reflex Demand Planning uses world-class multi-level business forecasting techniques, giving you more information and time to better understand your market and make decisions.
Using order history fed from your core ERP system, Reflex calculates your forecast by day, week or month, using auto-adaptive calculations based on algorithms developed with Manchester Metropolitan University. Reflex dynamically analyses demand or sales history and calculates seasonality and trend to create a base forecast for seasonalised sales.
Importantly, Reflex Demand Planning also allows the user to identify separate promotional activity, both in sales history and in the forecast. These events can be managed at any level in the hierarchy, minimising effort and improving accuracy.
A library of profiles can also be created, allowing the system to learn from past events and enhance projections. Accurate management of this process is crucial to successful business forecasting. Equally, the integration of future promotions and events enables the activity of the Sales and Marketing functions to be planned into the sales forecast.
Comparing forecast to budget and managing the financial processes is core to Reflex Demand Planning. Important commercial considerations such as margin effects and pricing are easily managed at a detailed or aggregate level. Financial and volume forecasts can be compared between products, family groups, customers and markets. Sales teams can be measured and incentivised on the margin and price effects of their activities.
Reflex Demand Planning software also drives a highly effective alerts system that will help users address weak forecasts. Alerts provide the user with a work schedule that will improve the forecast in the most efficient way. Based on a simple traffic lights model, it will highlight forecast inaccuracies and make continuous improvement a way of life.
Reflex Demand Planning supports multiple forecasting algorithms and methodologies to enable forecast improvement across all types of products: fast- and slow-moving, lumpy, short life cycle, trending, level and highly seasonal. It also supports the effect of causal variables.
Follow the link for insight into the key features of each supply chain modules and how they might be applied in your market.