Shift to "Glocalisation" vital to Organisations' success in 2021

• Key trends include: regionalising an organisation's footprint, increased use of robotics for manufacturing and logistics, and changing the cost model for production and sourcing
• Move from global to ‘glocal’ operations has gained significant momentum
• Middle East manufacturers are well-prepared for a successful glocalisation journey given their access to world-class technologies
• Report reflects various global perspectives on the shift towards glocalisation with a focus on the Middle East, Germany, India, the United States, Greater China, and the United Kingdom

Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; & Boston, United States of America: The Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit (GMIS), and leading professional services firm, PwC, today launched a new report outlining the 2021 key global trends that will enable manufacturers to succeed at glocalisation. The report, titled ‘The journey from globalisation to glocalisation, how COVID-19 has accelerated the shift to more local and flexible operations’ highlights that companies must regionalise their footprint, increase the use of robotics for manufacturing and logistics, and change the cost model for production and sourcing.

The report states that amid these emerging themes, COVID-19 has ensured that the case for moving from global to ‘glocal’ operations has gained significant momentum. The opportunities and related risks of glocalisation vary in importance between regions and sectors. With a focus on the Middle East, Germany, India, the United States, Greater China, and the United Kingdom, the report reflects various global perspectives where the pandemic has accelerated efforts by industrial companies to make inflexible global footprints more agile and responsive to demand.

Anil Khurana, Global Industrial Manufacturing & Automotive Leader & Principal at PwC in the United States, said: "In a post-pandemic world where reliable, real-time data is essential for both business and health and safety reasons, we anticipate an emerging trend for greater supply chain and operational collaboration between companies – whether through sharing automation technology to devise innovative, rapid solutions to bottlenecks, or joint sourcing of protective equipment to shield employees from the virus.

“A global economic disruption is unfolding in front of our eyes. The COVID-19 crisis hit when global supply chains were already under pressure from new tariffs and restrictions resulting from trade disputes. We now realise that designing operations and supply chains on the basis of cost optimisation alone can create risks, as the recent shortages in medical supplies, personal protective equipment (PPE), semiconductors, and others has shown us. How can future value chains deliver flexibility and resiliency, while enhancing the customer experience, in the midst of a number of geopolitical concerns? This “glocalisation” balancing act may mean different things for different countries, but at its core, it relies upon agile and multi-location global operations, and use of technology and digitalisation to ensure data-driven insights and decisions, greater transparency and resiliency, and improved efficiencies even at less-than-global scale.”

Khurana added: “This creates an imperative for countries and companies to upskill their workforce and enhance digital capabilities to stay competitive and relevant. We anticipate an emerging trend for greater supply chain and other forms of collaboration among groups of countries and companies, by both sharing lessons learned as well as co-developing new innovative solutions, as the recent experience with vaccine development and distribution has shown.”

The report highlights how digitalisation and automation enable companies to go more local by taking labour out of the supply chain and manufacturing equation. Furthermore, traditional supply chain approaches that focus narrowly on cost efficiency need to be broadened. Factoring in flexibility, resiliency, and customer experience can create differentiation in the marketplace and drive improved revenue growth. The report also focuses on how COVID-19 encourages supply chain and wider operational collaboration between companies, with automation helping to solve bottlenecks with innovative, rapid solutions.

Badr Al-Olama, Head of the Organising Committee for the Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit, said: “Digitalisation is critical to rolling out and implementing successful glocalisation strategies. Companies that have used advanced supply chain technologies have achieved greater transparency, flexibility, and local asset utilisation, in addition to seeing operational savings. However, if manufacturers fail to recognise the power of digitalisation, they will likely see their competitive edge erode. Across the Middle East, countries are prioritising the potential of the digital revolution, constantly seeking ways to support organisations - from the manufacturing sector and beyond – to develop their digital knowledge and capabilities.”

Providing a Middle East perspective, Dr. Bashar El-Jawhari, Partner and Leader of Industry 4.0, procurement and supply chain, PwC Middle East, said: “Despite challenges posed by the pandemic, we believe that the region is well-prepared for a successful ‘glocalisation’ journey in two respects. Firstly, major public and private sector companies have experience at building sustainable, flexible operations in a region afflicted by continuous challenges. Secondly, in recent years Middle Eastern countries led by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia and Qatar have made massive investments in information and communications technology (ICT) in order to reduce their dependence on oil revenues by creating dynamic, digitalised ‘knowledge economies’. As a result, manufacturers in the Middle East now have access to world-class technology to modernise and localise supply chains and production.”

The report was developed following the virtual panel session involving leading experts at PwC from across the world at the Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit’s Digital Series to discuss the increasing shift to ‘glocalisation’ on a national scale brought on by COVID-19, and its impact on operations and supply chains. The panel offered detailed views on different regional approaches and drivers used to forge a path to success amid this shift. The panel included Dr. Bashar El-Jawhari from PwC Middle East; Cara Haffey, Partner and Leader of Manufacturing and Automotive, PwC UK; Brett Cayot, Partner, Strategy & Operations, PwC USA; Jan Nicholas, Partner and Leader of Operations Consulting team, PwC Hong Kong; Shashank Tripathi, Partner, Government Strategy & Transformation Leader and Leader of Aerospace & Defence practice, PwC India; and Dr. Michael Wagner, Partner and Leader of PwC’s Fit for Growth transformation platform in EMEA, Strategy& Germany.

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Additional Insights - Country Perspectives

Germany

The report highlights that German industrial organisations will not roll back to globalisation. Instead, there will be a shift to a far more flexible global manufacturing footprint, with more localised physical value chains within a regional set-up. The report also emphasises that even before the pandemic, many German companies were adjusting their footprint to adapt capacities and networks to meet future demand, and the COVID-19 crisis has simply accelerated the execution of these strategic footprint decisions.

Michael Wagner, a partner in PwC Strategy&’s Industrials team in Germany said: “COVID-19 has disrupted supply chains and exposed an insufficient resiliency. Now is the time to bring efficiency and scale into balance with flexibility and robustness.

“Going forward, the report highlights that a growing number of companies will move to multi-sourcing strategies and a more flexible range of suppliers, while investing further in digital technologies, especially automation and robotics.”

India

The report highlights that while India is not yet a major manufacturing power, it is a leading exporter of digital technologies and skills that are now increasingly being applied by companies to develop robust, digitalised supply chains that can meet domestic and international demand. Due to India’s size, a critical challenge will be bringing hyper-local supply chains into the digital age through robotics and other advanced technologies. The investment is worth the potential prise of greater participation by Indian companies in global trade, even as an increase of “inward” home-based manufacturing reduces India’s import dependency.

Shashank Tripathi, PwC India’s Government Strategy and Transformation leader said: ”COVID-19 is both a crisis that has to be tackled and an opportunity to make bold, transformative decisions about operational models and supply chains.”

The United States

The report highlights how COVID-19 has significantly accelerated US companies to diversify manufacturing and supply chains and develop more agile, flexible operations that are both more efficient and closer to the end-user.

“US manufacturers were starting to consider factors that were not in the total cost model, such as resiliency, flexibility and customer experience”, says Brett Cayot, a partner in PwC’s US Strategy and Operations practice.

Based on analysis for PwC’s 2020 Supply Chain Resiliency Report, it is estimated that US manufacturers that shift production from China could cut operating costs by an average of 23% if they ‘near-shored’ to Mexico and by 24% if they transferred to another Asian low-cost country (LCC). However, some long-standing US companies in China may prefer to adopt a ‘China + 1’ model to avoid forfeiting well-developed supply and production networks or direct access to mainland customers.

Cayot added: “We expect to see more post-COVID-19 dual strategies where US manufacturers have operations in both the US and Mexico or in Mexico and another LCC in Asia.”

China

The report focuses on how manufacturers in China face challenges in satisfying both Chinese and international demand while balancing the geopolitical and economic tensions between the US and China without offending either country. This balancing act will require sensitive handling and is likely to influence footprint choices. The report highlights that while executives have so far been reluctant to commit to large-scale footprint change, the escalating tensions will force many companies to decide; those with clear mitigation strategies will come out ahead of those that defer until a decision is forced on them.

“US-China trade tensions mean companies are worrying about geopolitical risk first, and cost has become a boundary condition rather than the primary objective. They are aware that they cannot create a cost problem while addressing geopolitical risk, but cost no longer comes first,” said Jan Nicholas, leader of PwC’s operations consulting and supply chains team in Hong Kong.

The United Kingdom

The report highlights that the potential impact of Brexit on supply chains has prompted a wider political debate about the UK’s need to build onshore manufacturing capacity that is resilient and flexible. Yet this pressure to “go local” has been accompanied by warnings from UK business groups and manufacturing associations that it takes a long time – and careful planning – to change supply chains.

“Some companies have discovered that if they have more agile, flexible operations in multiple locations that are closer to the market they can sell more”, says Cara Haffey, PwC’s UK leader of Manufacturing and Automotive.

Media Collateral

• Press collateral (press release, imagery, links, etc.) is available to download on the following link: https://bit.ly/2LF4Swg
• Additional GMIS press assets are available here: https://bit.ly/31s6aQN

Photo captions:

• Image 1 – Anil Khurana, Global Industrial Manufacturing & Automotive Leader & Principal at PwC in the United States
• Image 2 – Badr Al Olama, Head of the Organising Committee for the Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit
• Image 3 – Dr. Bashar El Jawhari, Partner at PwC Middle East

About GMIS:

The Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit (GMIS) was established in 2015 to build bridges between manufacturers, governments and NGOs, technologists, and investors in harnessing the Fourth Industrial Revolution’s (4IR) transformation of manufacturing to enable the regeneration of the global economy. A joint initiative by the United Arab Emirates and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), GMIS is a global platform that presents stakeholders with an opportunity to shape the future of the manufacturing sector and contribute towards global good by advancing some of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

The first two editions of the Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit were held in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates in March 2017, and Yekaterinburg, Russia in July 2019, respectively, with each edition welcoming over 3,000 high-level delegates from over 40 countries.

GMIS 2020, the third edition of the Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit, was held virtually in September 2020 under the theme – Glocalisation: Towards Sustainable and Inclusive Global Value Chains, and convened over 10,000 attendees and close to 100 thought-provoking leaders from governments, businesses, and civil society.

To learn more about GMIS, please visit https://gmisummit.com/  and follow GMIS on Twitter:  @GMISummit, Instagram: @gmisummit, LinkedIn: GMIS - Global Manufacturing & Industrialisation Summit, and Facebook: @GMISummit.

Press Contact:
Reethu Thachil
Communications Manager

M Three Marcomms LLC, Press Office for:
Global Manufacturing & Industrialisation Summit
Mohammed Bin Rashid Initiative for Global Prosperity
reethu@m3media.com

Dana Safawi
PR Manager
PwC Middle East
dana.safawi@pwc.com 

© Press Release 2021