Plan for supply chain agility at Nokia: Lessons from the mobile infrastructure industry

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to describe how demand planning can increase agility in supply chains. The paper builds on a case study from mobile infrastructure industry with explicit focus on project business environment. Design/methodology/approach – The paper contains a short theoretical review on supply chain agility, different planning and forecasting concepts and explores the linkages between them. Empiric evidence is collected from Nokia Networks as a case study. Main lessons are primarily taken from integrated project management program that is to implement a truly customer-focused delivery process in the case company. Findings – Suppliers should pay more attention on effectively utilizing customer's project plans for aligning their supply chain. Supply chain agility does not just happen but requires continuous planning. Practical implications – Common project planning is the most natural way for customers to share future demand information between the supply chain players. Instead separate and often laborious demand forecasting process, suppliers should utilize customer's project plans in building agility in their supply chains. Originality/value – Focuses on the importance of the ability to adapt to rapid and unexpected changes and asserts that a continuous, customer driven planning process is a pre-requirement for being agile in supply chains.