It's only natural for customers to think that when they see a product they'd like to purchase at a store, they can simply buy it on the spot. But on sales floors all over the world, the crucial management issue of reducing inventory has made maintaining stock more challenging than ever.

For instance, about two months ago, an inkjet printer at a retail store here in Prague had left a factory in Thailand and was on a vessel bound for Western Europe. But based on the latest ever-changing sales data, the printer was rerouted while still at sea from Western Europe to Prague, where sales are brisk. As a result, the printer stayed on the vessel until it reached Hamburg, where it was shipped directly to a warehouse in Bratislava and then delivered to Prague.
In the past, the printer would have been received at a warehouse in Western Europe-its original destination-and then resent on a long truck voyage. Avoiding wasteful and unnecessary truck shipments not only shortens delivery times and lowers costs, it also reduces CO2 emissions.

Changing the shipping destination while still at sea is one of the many things made possible through well-developed supply chain management (SCM), which consolidates all the information about a product-from ordering to parts procurement, production, shipping, sales, and servicing-in a single location. With further innovation, it may be possible to limit inventories to only those products that are currently en route to their destinations.
IT innovations make the flow of goods even more efficient, and for this reason Canon is committed to further improving its SCM systems.