HYPERLEDGER FABRIC DEVELOPMENT FOR SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT: A TRANSFORMATIVE SOLUTION

Studies have shown that supply chain disruptions cause a massive 62% loss in finances. Further, a Statista study indicates that 43% of businesses consider a fragmented supply chain as one of its top challenges.

The current supply chain management system is laced with inefficiencies. These include lack of visibility, complex transaction processes, goods counterfeiting, fraud, and high costs. Moreover, these incompetencies lead to inventory mismanagement, difficult demand forecasting and limited logistics capacity for businesses.

Blockchain resolves these issues in the supply chain making the system efficient, decentralized and transparent. However, you cannot use a public blockchain network for your supply chain systems considering the sensitive nature of business.

Permissioned blockchain like Hyperledger Fabric comes as an ideal solution for the supply chain. With its modular architecture and Chaincode smart contracts, it is adaptable across diverse industries.

Additionally, Hyperledger Fabric enhances the security, privacy and transparency in the supply chain. High scalability, simplified transaction process, data visibility restrictions and authorized access are some of the notable benefits of Hyperledger Fabric supply chain solutions.

Let’s analyze the benefits Hyperledger Fabric brings to supply chain management. We will also review some of the companies that have already implemented Hyperledger Fabric supply chain management solutions.

Benefits of Hyperledger Fabric Supply Chain Management Solutions

Blockchain transforms the conventional supply chain system helping businesses streamline their logistics and inventory.

The key benefits of blockchain supply chain management solutions are:

· Increased transparency and traceability

· High data security

· Elimination of unnecessary middlemen

· Increase coordination and trust among parties

· Reliable shared ledger

· Lower costs

· Faster processes

· Improve efficiency

In addition to the above benefits, Hyperledger Fabric provides unique features that help businesses scale their supply chain management. They are:

Adaptability

Hyperledger Fabric boasts a versatile and adaptable architecture, making it a robust choice for permissioned network-based distributed ledger solutions across various industries. Its modular structure enhances its capacity to cater to diverse business needs.

Scalability

With remarkable scalability, Hyperledger Fabric is well-suited for large-scale applications, particularly in the realm of supply chain management.

Efficient Tracking

One of its key strengths lies in its efficient track and trace capabilities, fostering transparency and traceability throughout the supply chain journey, from the origin to the final destination. This feature not only simplifies tracking goods and materials but also helps curb fraud, enhance efficiency, and elevate product quality.

Customizability

The adaptability and customizability of Hyperledger Fabric empower developers to tailor it to their unique requirements. This flexibility allows businesses to fashion their own solutions without incurring licensing fees.

Defining business rules

In the context of supply chain management, chaincode, or smart contracts, play a pivotal role in defining business rules. These rules can encompass conditions for product shipment or criteria for accepting deliveries, adding precision to the process.

Assets tracking

Hyperledger Fabric represents assets as a series of key-value pairs, with transitions recorded as ledger route trades. Chaincode effectively tracks asset movement throughout the supply chain, delivering a transparent and auditable record of the entire journey.

Secure transaction process

Chaincode actions commence with a transaction concept, subjecting them to scrutiny against the ledger’s current state data. This secure and transparent process facilitates transactions like ownership transfers or invoice payments.

Confidentiality

Hyperledger Fabric’s channel architecture establishes sub-networks, promoting confidentiality. Here, specific transactions are visible only to designated nodes, preserving the privacy and security of sensitive data.

Top 3 Real-life Examples of Using Hyperledger Fabric In Supply Chain Management

Food Trust

Walmart collaborated with IBM to establish a blockchain-driven supply chain management solution, known as the Food Trust, with the primary objective of enhancing transparency and efficiency within its food supply network.

This innovative system enables the tracking of food product movement, right from the farm to the store shelves, thereby expediting the process of identifying the source of food contamination and preventing food-related illnesses.

The Food Trust, pioneered by Walmart, is designed to elevate transparency and responsibility within the food supply chain. It leverages blockchain technology to construct a secure and decentralized repository of data that can be accessed by all stakeholders involved in the supply chain.

Within the Food Trust ecosystem, suppliers can input detailed information about their products, including their origin, shipping particulars, and handling protocols. This information is then permanently recorded on the blockchain, creating an immutable ledger of the product’s journey.

Retailers and consumers can conveniently access this data via a mobile application or website, enabling them to trace the provenance of their food items and authenticate their legitimacy.

One of the pivotal advantages of the Food Trust lies in its ability to drastically reduce the time required to pinpoint the source of food contamination. In conventional supply chains, the process of identifying the origin of a foodborne illness outbreak may take several days or even weeks. In stark contrast, the Food Trust can achieve this within minutes, facilitating more precise product recalls and mitigating health risks.

Walmart, alongside other prominent retailers such as Carrefour and Nestle, has effectively implemented the Food Trust.

Beyond enhancing food safety, this system has streamlined supply chain operations, leading to reduced waste and cost savings.

In sum, the Food Trust serves as a compelling illustration of how blockchain technology can transform supply chain management and augment transparency and accountability within the food industry.

As more enterprises embrace blockchain-based solutions, similar benefits are poised to proliferate across a spectrum of industries.

XCEED

XCEED, short for “eXtended Compliance End-to-End Distributed,” is an innovative blockchain solution developed by the @renaultgroup for the European automotive industry.

Built upon the Hyperledger Fabric framework, XCEED serves the vital role of certifying the compliance of various components within a vehicle, spanning from the design phase to production.

The core purpose of XCEED is to establish a trusted network that facilitates the exchange of compliance information among different stakeholders within the automotive supply chain.

This network encompasses parts manufacturers, suppliers, and vehicle manufacturers. XCEED’s integration of blockchain technology, combined with the effective management of Big Data and Artificial Intelligence, forms the foundation of this comprehensive compliance certification system.

The collaborative effort behind XCEED involves prominent industry players, including Faurecia (specializing in instrument panels and seats), Renault Group, Knauf Industries (a Tier 1 and Tier 2 supplier of structural parts), Simoldes (specializing in interior trim and tool manufacturing), and Coşkunöz (engaged in the manufacture of stamped metal parts). IBM also plays a pivotal role in this initiative.

Initially, XCEED is slated for implementation in partner factories located around Bursa (Turkey), Douai (France), and Palencia (Spain).

The significance of this endeavour is underscored by the fact that a single automobile is subject to more than 6,000 regulatory specifications throughout its entire supply chain journey.

The conformity of the vehicle hinges on the adherence to each of these specific characteristics, including safety and regulatory features, geometric attributes, and material properties.

The anticipated benefits of XCEED are substantial, with the promise of enhancing productivity by 15% to 30% for the relevant services, reducing costs related to the management of non-quality and non-compliance by 10%, and cutting the incidence and cost associated with non-compliance in half.

This initiative underscores the potential for blockchain technology to revolutionize compliance management and efficiency within the automotive industry.

Trust Your Supplier

Trust Your Supplier, the recipient of the 2020 Blockchain Revolution Innovative Entrepreneurship in Blockchain Award in the Supply Chain Applications category, is a groundbreaking solution resulting from a collaboration between IBM and Chainyard.

This innovative platform is specifically designed to tackle the inefficiencies and risks inherent in supplier information management.

Trust Your Supplier introduces a real-time, comprehensive perspective on your suppliers. It achieves this by integrating dependable supplier data with enriched information obtained from reputable industry validators, thereby reducing vulnerabilities in the supply chain.

Powered by an advanced analytics engine that incorporates artificial intelligence (AI), this platform seamlessly combines functionality with robust cybersecurity measures to proactively manage supplier risk.

One of its primary functionalities is the continuous monitoring of suppliers’ adherence to regulatory compliance. This ongoing scrutiny ensures that a network of trusted suppliers is maintained at all times, fostering reliability and security within the supply chain ecosystem.

Trust Your Supplier is at the forefront of utilizing blockchain technology to transform supplier management and enhance the overall resilience of supply chain operations.

Conclusion

Hyperledger fabric supply chain management solutions help businesses with goods authenticity verification, asset tracking, cost reduction, compliance adherence and more.

Blockchain supply chain solutions stand on the pillars of decentralization, high data security and reliability making the infrastructure ideal for the present fast-packed business world.

Chaincode Consulting pioneering blockchain innovations has built top-notch supply chain solutions like OBORTECH and NFTrace to help businesses with greater control, provenance tracking and transparency.

If you are looking to redefine your supply chain solutions, contact Chaincode Consulting.