AGCO wins the BME Innovation Award 2020

The German Association for Supply Chain Management, Procurement and Logistics (BME) has honored AGCO International GmbH with the BME Innovation Award 2020. The award ceremony, which was postponed to this year due to the Corona pandemic, took place on Monday (8 November) in the afternoon plenary session of the 56th BME Symposium Purchasing and Logistics DIGITAL. The motto of the three-day online event is #newhorizons - looking ahead to the next normal! At the BME's largest networking event, speakers and participants will discuss the future and the associated new tasks for purchasing, logistics and supply management. AGCO Corporation is a global agricultural equipment and precision farming technology company. AGCO includes the five core brands Fendt, Massey Ferguson, Valtra, Challenger and Grain & Protein. The group employs 21,000 people, who generated an annual turnover of 9.1 billion $ in 2020. The associated AGCO International GmbH receives the BME Innovation Award 2020 for the successful transformation of its supply chain into an agile, integrated and digital value network. Rapid growth, brand diversity, external influences such as economic cycles, price fluctuations for agricultural commodities, weather extremes and climate change, or - most recently - pandemics pose special challenges to the supply chain of the global player. Increased flexibility and responsiveness within the AGCO supply chain organization is necessary to ensure supply to the plants in these situations while increasing competitiveness at the same time. Especially in times of crises, it was noticeable that there were weaknesses in cross-functional cooperation. AGCO Corporation has made a paradigm shift to a fully integrated organization with the AGCO Smart Supply initiative. The aim of the initiative was to create a cross-functional value network that can react better and faster to market fluctuations and customer requirements than other competitors by being more agile. Instead of traditional divisional silos, defined teams become active to safecard supply. They consist of Global Commodity Manager, Supply & Logistics Engineers, Material Manager und Supplier Quality Engineers. All these roles report to the same umbrella organization within which common processes, KPIs and targets are defined. The newly created roles of Supply & Logistics Engineers take on a particularly important role in the event of a crisis. They are present in the respective procurement market and, in combination with the umbrella organization, enable increased cross-plant coordination, such as quantity allocations with global suppliers.  As part of AGCO Smart Supply, the company's historically grown IT system landscape was fundamentally redesigned. This now enables, among other things, cross-plant and cross-functional data access in real time as well as harmonized electronic processes. Another key core element of AGCO Smart Supply is cross-functional supplier relationship and performance management. In order to be the "Customer of Choice" especially in times of crises, AGCO builds close personal relationships with critical suppliers at all levels. Suppliers are systematically developed across functions with the help of the Path-to-Partner program. "We can see from the current supply bottlenecks: The need for agile and resilient supply chains is higher than ever. By combining people, efficient processes and smart technologies, AGCO Smart Supply has achieved unprecedented efficiency, transparency and responsiveness," says Konstantin Meier-Kulenkampff , Vice President Purchasing & Materials EME at AGCO International GmbH. "Establishing a cross-functional value network through purchasing that can respond quickly when needed is a major competitive advantage. AGCO has impressively demonstrated how purchasing and supply chain management can be an important support for the company, especially in a crisis," emphasizes Christian Staab , BME Deputy Chairman and jury member. BME Innovation Award:
The BME Innovation Award is presented by the German Association for Supply Chain Management, Procurement and Logistics (BME). BME has been honoring successful, innovative purchasing and logistics management since 1986. From the group of companies submitting concepts, the jury nominated AGCO International GmbH, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH and Deutsches Milchkontor for the second round in October 2021. Due to its convincing concept, AGCO International GmbH emerged as the winner in the final competition. The winner is traditionally presented to the public at the BME Symposium Purchasing and Logistics.