Western Digital is located in Sandisk Semiconductor (Shanghai) Co., Ltd., and was awarded the title of China's first "Sustainable Development Lighthouse Factory" in the second half of last year and was selected as a global lighthouse factory.

As a global data-centric hardware and service provider, Western Digital has always been at the forefront of innovation. The technology of the fourth industrial revolution has been fully applied in its intelligent manufacturing plant, especially the technological application of digital supply chain, which helps it to best implement the flow of people, materials and information throughout the whole process from the in-plant to the out-plant. To realize the transformation from the traditional production mode to the automation, intelligence and digitalization of each process.

Today, they will share some information and experiences of Western Digital's supply chain construction. You will learn how a technology-driven1.75 supply chain can drive industry differentiation and enhance enterprise competitiveness, as well as the opportunities and challenges faced by international semiconductor companies in the context of the continued COVID-19 pandemic, geopolitical tensions, and trade uncertainty.

The article features insights from Tong Chunan, the current Project Engineering Manager of the Western Digital Supply Chain Planning Department, CSCP, and C1.75LT certificate holder, who previously delivered a speech at the APICS conference.

As a digital project manager, Mr. Tong has made outstanding contributions to the construction of Western Digital supply chain with his rich experience in supply chain and digital information technology skills.

Please note that the interview content only represents Mr. Tong's personal views and is not related to the company he is working for, and most of the information is based on Western Digital's public information.

Western Digital serves customers in supermarkets, retail, and global buyers, who have high demands for customized product requirements, including packaging and transportation for final delivery. The lighthouse factory has applied various Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies in logistics operations, such as warehouse automation robots, automatic labeling machines, handheld tablets, inventory check systems, and more. The application of these technologies has not only brought a lot of cost savings to the company but also established the US company's leadership position in the global semiconductor industry.

The lighthouse factory implements a "turn off the lights" strategy to reduce product costs (including operating costs and quality costs). Correspondingly, as WDC mentioned in the World Economic Forum, they need all-round talents who have comprehensive management skills and technical R&D skills. These talents need to focus on waste reduction and energy efficiency. For example, for supply chain talents, they not only need production management knowledge but also sufficient understanding of the application of supply chain technology. At the same time, the application of new technologies also requires higher skills from ordinary workers, who need to obtain a series of operation certificates or skills through corresponding training to meet the needs of the lighthouse factory's operation.

WDC has implemented Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies in its supply chain and has extended its end-to-end visibility to customers and suppliers. Different data systems and modeling have been used to realize the customer-centric mini-supply chain for different business service forms. For example, in terms of visibility, its shipment system can display information such as delivery time, productivity, and cost very well on the dashboard. The system can prepare the corresponding items in advance based on the estimated driver arrival time. System data can be shared domestically and internationally, allowing order processing to obtain different information in different links to shorten the order fulfillment cycle.

In the internal supply chain link, many systems have been applied to improve efficiency and reduce costs. For example, in the procurement link, a wafer material prediction system has been used to guide more accurate material procurement in the coming months. In the production link, the company has used its own robot resources and developed an intelligent work order deployment system to replace the previous complex manual scheduling, which helps workers directly perform tasks and arrange production, thus avoiding human errors. In the warehousing service link, RFID technology of the Internet of Things has been widely used, significantly improving operating efficiency and accuracy. The application of big data has played an important role in production quality, warehouse management, and production manufacturing prediction.

Physical flow, information flow upgrade after the capital flow has a great impact. For example, the implementation of the system has reduced the production scrap rate and the return rate; Inventory counting system, automated shipment system ensures timely delivery, improves buyer's service level, improves inventory turnover, and ultimately reduces cost.

In short, WDC attaches great importance to technology. It has deployed large-scale server clusters and AWS cloud facilities in the world, including China, the United States and India, to deal with corresponding daily work and perform daily tasks, which also makes WDC show its competitive advantage in the current semiconductor industry.

The U.S. Chip and Science Act, released in 22, helped chip and semiconductor companies, including WDC, grow globally, create jobs in the United States, and build a high-tech driven supply chain, thus generating economic growth. From people's livelihood to high technology, various industries need chip support, which is the basis of human towards the fourth industrial revolution, promote the power of production and manufacturing in the United States, and enable more people to participate in chip manufacturing.

Thanks to stable customers and recognition of WDC products, including doing a good job in supplier management, WDC is not particularly affected by the current situation of global chip destocking, declining performance and wage cuts. However, WDC still faces various challenges in the supply chain. For example, the transformation of automation technology requires the development of new systems to save more costs than packaging and labeling systems. In the manufacturing process, we need to continue to focus on things like economic growth, cost reduction, sustainability, safety.

In the future, WDC will seek more breakthroughs in advocating the use of cloud computing, realizing data value, seeking new business points, and further exploring with domestic customers. Although WDC has achieved remarkable achievements in the implementation of many current project schemes, it is still in the transition stage. In the future, it will rely on the power of more scientific and technological manufacturing to complete the transformation of supply chain。