25/07/2020
SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT ( SCM )
 A supply chain should be characterized by an ongoing process of improvements. Therefore, managing the supply chain, being the coordinator of this chain, becomes a very important task. Today, there is an increase in customer requirements in terms of duration of delivery services, their flexibility, availability and reliability. The expectations and the requirements of customers grow and, on the other hand, a need occurs to reduce costs and limit the amount of capital tie-up. Currently, it is very important for consumers that products and services are tailored to their individual needs. Consumers are becoming more and more impatient. How to meet these expectations in the context of the supply chain? The required speed of response and need to ensure a high level of safety, as well as the possibility to efficiently respond to potential dangers in the supply chain, generates the need to use all the modern technical and technological solutions and latest concepts for the functioning of logistics, including solutions from the area of telematics. The broadest area of use of telematics solutions in the supply chain is, of course, transport, which combines the individual links. In this case, telematics, or rather telematics of transport, will refer to the movement of people and goods (the cargo), using the appropriate means of transport and technical solutions – organizational, which through integrating IT and telecommunication solutions allow for proper management and control of movement in transport systems to improve efficiency and safety of operation of these systems and positively affect the environment. The objective of telematics is to support, supervise, control and manage the processes in transport and link these systems within all transport tasks carried out in the supply chain. The priority element for the implementation of these tasks in telematics systems are functions of operating of information, which primarily relates to the collecting, processing and distributing of data essential for making the right decision. Such processes are both processes implemented in the manner determined in advance (for example, automatic control of movement) or processes arising from the ad hoc situations (decisions of the operators, dispatchers, independent users of infrastructure such as drivers or pedestrians, etc., supported by updated information) (Wydro 2002). Today, the ability to ensure fluent and efficient transport of people and goods, transport prepared for the implementation of tasks under conditions of interference, is an essential requirement. The way to guarantee such possibilities is the introduction and extensive use of telematics solutions in the supply chain. The delay in implementation or the lack of such solutions will affect the level of competitiveness and will generate the unsustainable use of logistic infrastructure.