Hardware business and inflation

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When thinking about #supplychain #planning for #hardware business, you will inevitably be confronted with a macro situation and you will have to make a judgment about how is it gonna affect you & your business! That judgment needs to come from understanding... ⬇️

...how the situation affects 1/ your customer 2/ your supply chain partners 3/ your sales channel partners ⬇️

Now that is a hard problem because of many unknowns but we now know one thing for sure and that's where you should start -> there's a global increase in #inflation <- That's your start! Simple, right. Now you only have to make up your mind about... ⬇️

...whether inflation increase was driven more by 1/ excessive aggregate demand including loose monetary, credit, and fiscal policies everywhere (and we know for sure that it was the main driver of the stock-markets uptrend in 2021) or ⬇️

2/ by negative supply shocks including the initial COVID-19 lockdowns, supply-chain bottlenecks, a reduced US labor supply, the impact of Russia’s war in Ukraine on commodity prices, and China’s “zero-COVID” policy (where these could result in a stagflationary environment) ⬇️

Once you pick your side - you can plan accordingly. If you are doom(er) then you'll say it's both and you are fckd anyway so do nothing differently and just wait for the market to pick a side for you 🤔 (this is a joke! hope you're not even thinking about joining this camp) ⬇️

But say you have your informed opinion...which obviously depends on your industry, size, type of product and where in product life-cycle you are, but all that taken into account, by choosing your side... ⬇️

...you now know what you should be doing with regards to: - hiring - inventory - debt levels - pricing - promotions So get at it. Summer is in full swing and business always speeds up in Q3-Q4 but you must be ready for it (yesterday)! 😉