Supply Chain
Technology Podcast

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

Supply chain, real-time business intelligence, Etihad Airlines, aircraft spares, digitization, manual reports, GPS tracking, productivity increase, COVID-19 impact, equipment tracking, sustainability, collaboration, ROI, innovation.

SPEAKERS

Scott Mears, Paulo Echeverri

Scott Mears  00:07

Welcome to the Supply Chain Tech Podcast with Roambee. Scott Mears here, Global Field Marketing Manager at Roambee and one of the hosts of the Supply Chain Tech Podcast. We thank you for joining us today. In this episode, we speak with Paulo Echeverri. Paulo is the Senior Production Planning Manager and Control Technical Operations at Etihad Airlines. In this episode, we discuss Etihad Airlines’ journey with Roambee, we find out how they are preventing the loss and cost leakage of their flare away kits, a common challenge in the airline industry, and we also learn where else they are now looking to scale real time business intelligence in their supply chain to deal with other challenges. Welcome, Paulo, uh, welcome to the podcast. How are you?

Paulo Echeverri  00:55

Good. Good ,Scott. Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Scott Mears  00:59

It’s wonderful. It’s wonderful to have you on and really interesting to learn more about the use case you have with Roambee and really understand, you know, what the challenges were overcoming and but first of all, I always like to start with a bit of an icebreaker to learn a bit more about, I guess. And you know, when I was learning a lot about your background, it was, you know, you you look, you know, you’re very focused on aviation. I clearly see that through, you know, for your education, your career history, you’re very, you know, it seems like you knew what you wanted to do early. So I’m interested to know what this answer is. Is, if you had another job in supply chain, what would it be and why?

Paulo Echeverri  01:37

Well, yeah, it’s a very good question. Actually, I’m very being part of an airline number one and number two, looking after elements of supply chain. I think digitization and supply chain sometimes it relates to innovation and digitization of the supply chain, I will say, because, again, coming up with Roambee and other solutions in the market at the moment where we’re able to get real kind of information. It just makes a big difference, whether it’s saving time or increasing productivity. Definitely, something I would like to invest my time on is that’s the future, or anything related to innovation, digitization of supply chain.

Scott Mears  02:17

Understood. So in the innovation sector, that’s that’s really interesting to see. And it’s, yeah, it’s forever evolving. And something that, that’s what I absolutely love working within that side of the industry, is it’s always evolving. You’re always having to learn and see what’s moving and it’s a really exciting space to be in, but when you also have to keep up with so that’s, it’s an interesting insight into into where you would be if you if you weren’t here today in your role, I’d love to first, before we get into the meat of the podcast, I’d love to first learn a bit more about Etihad Airlines. So I would love to know what is it that makes Etihad and your supply chain different to others in the industry.

Paulo Echeverri  03:01

Okay, well, Etihad is, as you might know, we’re one of the top airlines in the world. We, we’re, we are the national airline of the UK, and we’re based on the capital of Abu Dhabi. So we are part of that ecosystem that supports tourism and the economy. So the airline has a big responsibility on making sure that other industries besides the airline are also supported around so we bring cargo, we bring passengers, we support the hotel industry, the local economy. So if you look at it, from end to end, supply chain, working for the airline, it’s a big responsibility, because a lot of airlines just focus on flying passengers from A to B. Etihad Airways takes more than that. It’s more about what do we contribute to the country, to the economy and to the entire ecosystem of Abu Dhabi and the UAE itself. So what would make this different to others is that other airlines are just airlines, but they’re just focusing on flying passengers, like I said, from A to B being on time. But for us, it’s more than that. It’s ensuring that even if we carry cargo or any other items, is that we are delivering things for a bigger objective. It’s not just about dropping a part or dropping a passenger, then eventually the end result had as a consequence, whether it’s positive or negative. So understanding the supply chain needs to work perfectly is one of the main responsibilities of these airlines. So that’s what we take a lot of pride of.

Scott Mears  04:39

Wonderful. It’s really interesting to see how, you know, you define Etihad as, you know, different within the industry. And I always love to, you know, learn that unique quality about company and to understand how they stand out and, you know. And it really seems Etihad, you know, focuses on that quality to a high standard, and that supply chain is, you know, it keeps the wheels running. To say, you know, it keeps the wheels running. So it’s going to be interesting now to learn, really, in the detail of your supply chain and how it works in Etihad. So I would love to know, you know, I’m familiar with the challenges that you were facing before taking on real time business intelligence, but for the audience, listeners, watchers, I would love to know what, what were the challenges that you faced before adopting real time business intelligence?

Paulo Echeverri  05:25

Yeah, well, excellent question. And I think very pretty much a lot of industries are suffering the same that have not gone into exclusive innovation is that we used to work with Excel sheets and manual reports and as being an airline that flies at 24/7 all over the world. We most of the things that we do as an airline is support our own aircraft. So we bring spares for our aircraft to maintain the speed as well. But besides passengers and besides cargo, we we move spares for the aircraft. We fly to a lot of the places around the world where there’s not much technical support, you know, very remote areas. So onboard our aircraft, we carry spares to ensure that, in case something happens to the aircraft, we have something, you know, to back it up with. So that’s important, because the cost, the cost of not having technology, it’s much more and even greater than waiting for something to happen and then realize that someone made a mistake on an Excel sheet or a report to say, I sent this on board the aircraft, and in fact, it wasn’t even there. It was used somewhere else. And and that having that on time information makes a big difference.

Scott Mears  06:40

Absolutely it must. You know, there must be just so much maintenance material you need as well. You know that the vast variation of planes that you’re operating with, and even just the vast knowledge that you need to be able to, you know, deal with individual pains and the mechanics of it, that must be quite challenging as well. Just having the amount of resource and and I know even that’s something I didn’t think of when I was, you know, learning more was just even making sure that the end the engineer has a visa if they were to be left at the destination. I was like, I didn’t even think about that. Like, it gets really complex when you get into the detail of it. And it can be, yeah, it’s a lot to think about, yeah.

Paulo Echeverri  07:20

And Scott, it’s not really, and sometimes it’s not about the volume of parts of parts, of the value of those stairs. So aircraft parts are very expensive, number one, because of the design. You know, anything that you put on aircraft has to have certifications. So normally, you know, one screw can be just $100 you might think of it if you see it on the street, it’s something that you might take around and get it off, you know, of your foot. But, you know, we talk about screws on airplane and could be just $100 each, or aircraft computers that could be a million dollars. These are the things that we fly on board. So sometimes it’s not about the volume, it’s about the value of the spares that we carry.

Scott Mears  07:59

Wow, so very high value items as well. So yeah, absolutely another challenge on why they would be interesting in moving forward real time intelligence, and I’d love to know before we do get into that pieces, how were you dealing with those challenges before you adopted real time business intelligence?

Paulo Echeverri  08:18

Well, it did require a lot of manual work, like I said, so on a daily basis, we our teams have to meet very frequently just to give updates on, you know, the status of bears that are being moved around all over the world on a different aircraft as well, and sharing reports frequently and continuously. And depending on that, someone else’s report was correct, of course, but it required a lot of manual report. It was the updating of the Excel sheets, for example, and then having to meet frequently with someone so taking time away from from a busy office day just to have an update on something that was happening. And that’s where you know the values productivity at work. A lot of manual a lot of time wasted to get updated reports or even inaccurate.

Scott Mears  09:09

Yeah, a lot of manual work. And we see that a lot as well ourselves. We see that a lot, and it’s, it’s interesting to see, you know, the differences can make. And I’d love to know what was your approach to increasing your supply chain visibility brand be I know you know, you’ve tried different senses, and what was your approach to increasing your visibility in your supply chain?

Paulo Echeverri  09:30

Well, we were looking for different solutions, but the solution was that we wanted something that could do two things at the same time. So for example, we were looking at the time for tracking our spares or GPS trackers, right? But besides that, we wanted to get real time information on certain things. Now, when you fly spares on aircraft, anything that goes inside the cargo, it could be temperature sensitive. But for us, you know, when we fly cargo, we fly airplane spares on port. The temperature of the cargo might affect the spare. You know, when you store an item, we know, remember, you buy a computer, so that’s stored in high heat, right? You can leave your laptop in your car. It’s 40 degrees outside because it gets damaged. Besides tracking parts, we also wanted to know certain elements of how the items being stored, we’re looking for a solution that could give us both things at the same time. So how many research the market and everyone you know, they offer different things. But it was only came to solution that that will offer not just the visibility in real time, the location, but also reporting that you know, at any point in time, I could get a report for the last 30 days where, where things moved around. So in a way, with the solution that we found Roambee, we were basically set up two things that we’re looking for, we ended up with, and that’s basically how we came up with the solution.

Scott Mears  10:59

Yeah, and that’s interesting to see you say that you weren’t just looking for the sensors to give us that intelligence. You were actually looking for the platform that that plugs into, and again, that it’s such an important piece, and something, you know, we’ve put a lot of time into, in making sense of that data. Otherwise, you end up back in your same position with the Excel spreadsheet, because you have thousands and millions of lines of all sorts of alerts and and you know, a lot of these alerts aren’t actually of interest, and a lot of these alerts it needs, you need to make sense of and understand, Okay, well, what does that mean? Why did that temperature excursion happen? Or why you can get a lot more sense from doing a lot of work with the AI, with bringing that data together. And that’s wonderful, too, that you were looking at that piece as well. Because, you know, people would tend to sometimes go just for the centers and realize they need that piece at a later date. And it’s just, you know, makes the whole thing a lot harder. I would love to know, then, what is it that your benefits you are now achieving that you were not before. Now you’ve adopted this.

Paulo Echeverri  12:02

So yeah, going back to the same thing, what? Increase what we received out of this as a, as a, as a result, basically, we remove the wasted time that we were spending tracking flares and understanding what were they doing in real time, because we were able to set the system to tell us when it moved inside the aircraft, they will know, or if it left a certain area, will trigger alerts. So all those issues will basically solve by having a solution that will give real time information, because we were able to based on our needs. So, you know, a lot of times you buy products that are, you know, one size fits all right. It’s not your product. This is what works. But not everyone works the same way. You know, the solution was able to give us that we were able to figure it based on our needs, put the trigger points that we were able we wanted to know, when does it report at what time? How many times per day? And that, obviously, our productivity basically increased by 90% we were able to eliminate manual reports, and the best thing out of the moment, I can use it on my mobile phone, so anytime, instead of logging into my computer at work, I was able, even from my time off, my days off, I needed to know anything urgent, I will just log into my phone and look for the status of anyone else.

Scott Mears  13:26

That’s fantastic here. And, yeah, just a simple thing like that, thinking that it had been loaded onto the plane, and now you can actually verify that. And I’m guessing it’s also, you know, helped a lot with retrieving it also, because I know there’s, there’s a lot of cases sometimes where it’s actually left at the destination, has it helped with that as well, you know, retrieving,

Paulo Echeverri  13:47

Yeah, actually we it was funny, because during COVID 19, you know, a lot of airports were locked down, you know, around the world. So I think during, during those times, the solution had just, we had just adopted the solution. And part of our business case to adopt the solution was this can help us prevent the loss of spares, right? We thought it might happen. It might not happen. Well, funny thing is, around in beginning of 2022, we had an aircraft, I believe, in India, where we sent some spares to fix an aircraft there and well, what happens is the ground handling people took this big container, put in an area of the airport, and completely forgot about it. So our aircraft eventually came back for home base, but we couldn’t find the spares. Well, I think it’s no problem. We logged into the system and we found exactly what it was. It was that, by mistake, they sent it to a wrong a wrong warehouse inside an airport in India. The container was basically confused with another baggage container, even though it had labels and everything. But we were able to tell the our representative in India and the specific locations from the GPS score. Go look for it, and within two hours, we have them. We have it. The values inside this container were over $2 million worth of spares. So in the meantime, show my boss. Look. We found it less than two hours. This would have never happened if we wouldn’t have anything like this.

Scott Mears  15:19

That’s you know that for me, when I hear lines like that, that really hits at home for why, you know, you know, I work within a company like Roambee, because, you know, $2 million you know, without that, you know, we’ve taken much more time to find it, maybe never found, you know, and that’s, that’s a lot of money to be lost. So that’s yeah, that’s quite a good thing to overcome. Yeah. And how is this evolution in the company change your thinking and strategy when you now think about your supply chain for the future?

Paulo Echeverri  16:00

Yeah? Yeah. Well, I think supply chain was never as important as it is today. And maybe given to the point that maybe COVID 19, the pandemic, was more of a an element of that where it made people realize how important your supply chain is. A lot of it, people just thought, oh, supply chain just moving parts, moving cargo around from A to B, but now that we’re seeing the effects of the pandemic, you know, understanding where your spares are going, why are they delayed? It makes a big difference for any business today, even today, even it’s been so long since we came out of COVID, but the effects of COVID is still being felt all over the world, but at least giving us the confidence that we can only see where our spares are going and what they are, the ones that we’re tracking with the solution, it gives the comfort that we have to worry too much.

Scott Mears  16:50

Absolutely and how are you now looking with, you know, now you’ve sold, you know, or very much, you’ve you’ve dealt with those, those challenges that You are facing. How are you now looking to scale that real time business intelligence to deal with maybe other challenges within your supply chain you’re aware of?

Paulo Echeverri  17:09

Yeah, actually, it’s good because we recently, we started, this is very small project, right? We and all during COVID, at the very beginning of COVID, it started a very small project. We were trying to prove the point that we use this, you know, solution that is basically invaluable compared to what you’re carrying on board. Anyway, the case went through, and we started really small, but as as we were coming out of COVID, we found that there were, we have already a lot of good cases where we were able to prove that the solution works. So now, instead of just tracking our spares onboard the aircraft, we’ve now used the solution between track and run equipment. So we use a lot of equipment to move engines on the ground. They don’t leave the airport, but sometimes our engineers and technicians, they’re looking for a high lift equipment and finding the size of a mega hug, if you only have, let’s say, for high lift equipment, they can be all over the airport and then going to spend time. So with now using solutions, the solution even track some of our expensive equipment, the critical part. And now everyone is able to plug in when they come into the shift if, in particular, they have a task plan at work, or they need the equipment, they know where it is so that is now expanded outside of the interface, using it for our.

Scott Mears  18:33

That’s really interesting to how you know you’ve evolved that to look other challenges. And absolutely, you know, airports, they’re, they’re no small places. They are very large. And, you know, there’s, there’s a lot of places where items and equipment can be hiding. And I’d love to ask an additional question on that now I’m thinking about it is, how is, you know, when you know companies are looking to invest in this, you know, this sort of technology, and the solution, one of their worries can be, can be, yes, at top level, this is great. I can see the visibility. I know everything is but the people on the ground, the people on the ground who have done the same thing as they’ve always done, the way they’ve operated. Now, suddenly have this app. Now suddenly have and they have to, you know, get their head around that. Understand how, what have you found that evolution in the net?

Paulo Echeverri  19:22

Well, yeah, excellent question, because it’s very true. I mean, my airline, my organization, has gone through a major exhibition strategy for the last four years, and the culture is one of the most difficult things to change, because they might get used to those Excel sheets and they find them completely acceptable. So when we talk about change. We’re talking about the business of the change. So whenever we introduce any change related to digitization, so what is the case for change? So we need to sell it. How do we sell it to the end users? So anything that we do related to patient digitization, we build a case. So we take examples, so things that hey, you might be doing display but imagine if we do this, and now you don’t have to do any of that. So we tend to. So for everything that we do, we run workshops with end users, and even the examples, we put them together in a room and says, what are the what are the issues that you face today? For example, they explain, you know, what are the issues? The thing that the time they spend? And with that information, we build the case. Hey, we have a solution, and it will do all this for you, and you don’t have to do any of this. Instead, you can focus on something else. So this is when they’re able to actually see that. Oh, that’s this is interesting, because if not, you just buy another piece of equipment, and they really use it, maybe not. And this is something that happens very frequently, where companies spend a lot of money, and this is the case, or even us, where, if you don’t have an approach to the taxation, how are you going to sell it? Do the case for it, so that you can convince the end users to use it. It’s not going to work. That approach needs to be there to be a strategy. Every time you bring change, like you said, it’s doing the case.

Scott Mears  21:05

That piece there, for me, is the biggest learning already in this episode. I think that’s something I you know, see, a lot of companies don’t factor in as much, and don’t take that as much into consideration of how valuable that is. You know, this technology, you know, we know it’s, you know, we know that, you know that’s going to deal the challenge. But the reality is, if the boots on the ground, you know, don’t understand, or aren’t on board, then it’s not going to get used, you know, it’s not going to get implemented correctly. And you know, so it’s so nice to see again, Etihad valuing that. And I love how you bring them in, make them part of that journey, rather than just sort of coming into right? This is now the change, and I think really, we’ve answered the next question, but I’m going to ask anyway, just in case you want to throw something else in there is, what would your advice be to other companies in in the industry facing similar challenge to yourself, to Etihad Airlines, who are thinking about investing in real time business intelligence.

Paulo Echeverri  22:01

Well, yeah, great question. I always go for the for the 2080 2080 advice, where do you spend 20% that it can deliver 80% so, yeah, a lot of businesses, especially a smaller business, you know, with tight budgets, they focus on the one time, but tend to forget, what is the cost of not having that now? And I understand there might be solutions that are extremely expensive that will make someone think, well, maybe can we live with it? But you always gotta look at, where do I spend 20 to give me 80? And that’s always the best approach for especially for those companies that are, you know, lean and low budget, that are trying to get, you know, a big advantage of something very small. And this is a perfect example, because compared to what we carry and the value of things, what we’re spending is peanuts, and it might be a one time investment that is, you know, even though it’s small for such a big airline. But if you were a small airline or a small company, again, you always gotta think of what will be the cause of not having it in the long term. So when you start thinking is ahead and in the future is either your ROI or the value of the because being something small, but the benefit of having it is huge.

Scott Mears  23:16

Absolutely. I love that 80/20 rule as well. That’s a really good way of visualizing, really, where you need to focus your attention on, really, the value can gain back. So thank you so much, baller. Really interesting answer, and I think a lot to take away from for everyone else in the industry and even other industries looking to explore this solution. I would love to finish the episode with a fun segment we like to do. It’s a it’s a thumbs up, thumbs down. It’s very simple. It’s just, if you agree with it, it’s a thumbs up, and if you don’t agree, it’s a thumbs down. And if you could both put your hand up, thumbs up, thumbs down, also audibly say it thumbs up, thumbs down. And that will allow both watchers and the audio listeners to to know what your answer was the question. And there may be some funny ones in there, and they may be some hard to answer. So we’ll see, see where we go with this. And if I say supply chain heroes, I mean everyone who works in supply chain. So so be six, five questions. So supply chain heroes need more real time business intelligence.

Paulo Echeverri  24:23

Thumbs up.

Scott Mears  24:25

All supply chain heroes should support Manchester City,

Paulo Echeverri  24:30

Definitely a thumbs up.

Scott Mears  24:33

Controversial one. Supply chain heroes need to become better at predicting disruption and risk.

Paulo Echeverri  24:40

A key element in supply chain prediction. So definitely, thumbs up.

Scott Mears  24:48

All flight delays are caused by supply chain.

Paulo Echeverri  24:53

There we go. It’s actually not true, not true, but when it does, it gets very expensive. It when you realize the supply chain failed. So first that could be a thumbs up and thumbs down. But.

Scott Mears  25:11

if it is definitely not, yeah, companies need to become more sustainable.

Paulo Echeverri  25:17

Definitely a thumbs up, definitely a thumbs up. I mean, that’s key, and especially for the future. You know, you know the point of start, stop printing and wasting valuable resources. Sustainability, it’s not just about, you know, paper or CO2. It’s about saving other resources. Well, know how to be lean and more effective at the end of the day, you save in some way or another. But being sustainable, definitely, supply chain will be a big element.

Scott Mears  25:48

Absolutely. And final one is we need to, we need more collaboration partnerships in supply chain.

Paulo Echeverri  25:55

Definitely. And that’s been thumbs up, of course. It’s been one of the key elements for my organization, the way we collaborate and partner with, you know, you just don’t see, even if you see another airline, they’re not always competition. You know, on a commercial side of business, yes, there are competitions. But as an organization, as a supply chain to supply chain, or business to business, there needs to be more collaboration. And this has happened all over the world, when we realize that besides having a commercial agreement or competition in some way or another, being able to collaborate for an end result of something greater than that is much more.

Scott Mears  26:34

Absolutely, that’s a wonderful way to finish off the episode. I thank you so much, Paulo, it’s been a very interesting episode. I feel we’ve dived into a lot and learnt a lot. So I know the audience are going to love this one. If we could just finish off the episode with a little wave to the camera and.

Paulo Echeverri  26:51

Thanks for having me, Scott.

Scott Mears  26:53

Hi, my name is Scott Mears, and I’m one of the hosts of the Supply Chain Tech Podcast with Roambee. On this podcast we talk to supply chain heroes from around the world about everything, ranging from the disruptions related to supply chains, their personal experiences with tracking technologies, strategies to build resilience, and much, much more. We already have some recommended videos for you to the side of me, and if any of this sounds interesting to you, do subscribe to our Youtube channel and hit the bell icon so you don’t miss another Roambee video. I’ll see you next time.