Supply chain news: Ryder revamps global and domestic Supply Chain Solutions group

Jeff Berman, Senior Editor -- Logistics Management, 12/3/2007

MIAMI—Global transportation and supply chain management services provider Ryder System Inc. said last week it will be merging its United States and international supply chain solutions (SCS) business units in an effort to form a singular, integrated organization to better serve shippers on a global basis.

The company said in a statement that this initiative will formally align supply chain expertise, business resources, and management resources to support the increasing global sourcing and production needs of Ryder’s North America customer base and growing international customer demand.

Ryder Vice President of Corporate Communications David Bruce told Logistics Management that part of this decision to integrate the its supply chain units was based on the fact that Ryder operates this way across company business units and geographies for quite some time.

Bruce explained that in 2006 Ryder rolled out a global account management initiative that integrated the company’s SCS expertise and resources from various business units and operations worldwide into a collaborative network to improve consistency of global customer support.  He said this process enabled Ryder to focus more on customer-specific matters and went very well.

“The integration of the SCS units is the next step in that progression,” said Bruce. “It is a move from a model where we had a management person focused on the domestic client base and then international. Although that was the existing structure still there, it is almost impossible to look at any [shipper] that is a significant supply chain customer as just a domestic or international SCS customer. This really organizes the formal structure of the company to be more in line with how it is been for the last couple of years…and it establishes one global head of the SCS product line so that everything reports to that person. It is a logical progression for us.”

Ryder also announced that Vicki O’Meara, president of its U.S. SCS group is leaving the company to pursue other opportunities. The company said it will be conducting an internal and external search for a new head of the Global SCS unit.

Globally speaking: Ryder has roughly 3,000 supply chain employees in Latin America, with primary operations in Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, and Chile, according to Bruce. Since 2000, it has had a presence in Asia, with established operations in China that are serving four or five customers, he said. Much of the Asia-based business, he said, resulted from demand from existing customers there. It has served Canada for 50 years, beginning with the trucking and leasing arms of its business. And it established operations in the United Kingdom in 1972, when it first moved into Europe.