Demand Chain Management

Same as supply chain management, but emphasizing consumer pull rather than supplier push.

Demand-Driven Supply Network (DDSN)

A system of technologies and processes that sense and react to real-time demand across a network of customers, suppliers, and employees. In other words, a consumer purchase triggers real-time information movement throughout the supply network, which then initiates the movement of products through the network.

Demand Management

The proactive compilation of requirements information regarding demand (i.e., customers, sales, marketing, finance) and the firm's capabilities from the supply side (i.e., supply, operations, and logistics management); the development of a consensus regarding the ability to match the requirements and capabilities; and the agreement upon a synthesized plan that can most effectively meet the customer requirements within the constraints imposed by the supply chain capabilities.

Demand Planning

The process of identifying, aggregating, and prioritizing all sources of demand for the integrated supply chain of a product or service at the appropriate level, horizon, and interval is called sales forecasting. The sales forecast is comprised of the following concepts: 1. The sales forecasting level is the focal point in the corporate hierarchy where the forecast is needed at the most generic level (i.e., corporate forecast, divisional forecast, product line forecast, SKU, and SKU by location). 2. The sales forecasting time horizon generally coincides with the time frame of the plan for which it was developed (i.e., annual, 1-5 years, 1-6 months, daily, weekly, and monthly). 3. The sales forecasting time interval generally coincides with how often the plan is updated (i.e., daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly).

Demand Planning Systems

The systems that assist in the process of identifying, aggregating, and prioritizing all sources of demand for the integrated supply chain of a product or service at the appropriate level, horizon, and interval.

Demand Pull

The concept defined in lean theory triggers the production of materials only upon receipt of an actual customer order and aligns the production capacity of the supply chain to external customer demand patterns.

Demand Sensing

Using channel data to reduce latency in sensing customer buying trends.

Demand Shaping

Using programs, including pricing, new product launches, trade and sales incentives, promotions, and marketing programs, to increase what customers want to buy.

Demand-Side Analysis

A system based on economic, geographic, and demographic trends offers planners an opportunity to gain an accurate perspective on future demand for products or services.

Demand Signal

A signal from a consumer, customer, or using operation that triggers the issue of a product or raw material. The demand signal is most efficiently an electronic data transmission, but it could be a physical document, kanban, or telephone call.

Demand Supply Balancing

The process of identifying and measuring the gaps and imbalances between demand and resources in order to determine how to best resolve the variances through marketing, pricing, packaging, warehousing, outsourcing plans, or some other action that will optimize service, flexibility, costs, assets (or other supply chain inconsistencies) in an iterative and collaborative environment.

Demand Time Fence (DTF)

A feature of MRP-type systems allows for defining the point in time, from the current date, where all forecasted orders should be discarded in favor of actual customer orders. There may be a blend of actual and forecast orders beyond the time fence. See consuming the forecast, planning time fence, and time fence.

De-manufacturing

Refers to the process of retrieving assets, harvesting their components and parts. After the components are tested, they may be sold in the secondary market or upgraded to 'as new' and used in production again.

Deming Circle

An iterative four-step problem-solving process typically used in business process improvement is known as the Shewhart cycle, Deming Wheel, or Plan-Do-Study-Act. It is also referred to as Plan-Do-Check-Action.

Demographic Segmentation

A market segmentation strategy where the intended audience for a given product is divided according to geographic units, such as nations, states, regions, counties, cities, or neighborhoods.

Demurrage

The carrier charges and fees are applied when rail freight cars and ships are retained beyond a specific loading or unloading time. Also, see Detention.

Denied Party List (DPL)

A listing of all the entities with whom a company cannot do business due to company policy or government requirements, the Export DPL list is based on information supplied by the United States Government Federal Register and other sources.

Density

A physical characteristic of a commodity is its mass per unit volume or pounds per cubic foot. This is an important factor in rate making, as density affects the utilization of a carrier's vehicle.

Density Rate

A rate based on the density and shipment weight.

Department of Energy (DOE)

Cabinet-level department in the United States Government, charged with developing energy and safety policies and guidelines regarding the handling of nuclear material within the United States.

Department of Homeland Security (DHS)

Cabinet-level department in the United States government responsible for protecting the United States from terrorist attacks and natural disasters.

Depot

A location where a substance is stored, usually for later utilization, is called a storage facility. A repair depot, on the other hand, is a location or facility where assets are rebuilt or repaired.

Deregulation

Revisions or complete elimination of economic regulations controlling transportation occurred. The Motor Carrier Act of 1980 and the Staggers Act of 1980 revised the economic controls over motor carriers and railroads, while the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978 eliminated economic controls over air carriers.

Derived Demand

A term in economics, where the demand for one good or service occurs as a result of the demand for another. This may occur as the former is a part of the production of the second. For example, the demand for coal leads to derived demand for mining, as coal must be mined for it to be consumed.

Design for Manufacture / Assembly (DFMA)

A product design methodology that provides a quantitative evaluation of product designs.

Design of Experiments (DoE)

A branch of applied statistics dealing with planning, conducting, analyzing, and interpreting controlled tests to evaluate the factors that control the value of a parameter or group of parameters.

Destination-Enhanced Consolidation

Ganging of smaller shipments to cut costs, often as directed by a system or via pooling with a third party.

Detention Fee

The carrier charges and fees are applied when rail freight cars, ships, and carriers are retained beyond a specified loading or unloading time. Also, see Demurrage and Express.

Deterministic Models

A mathematical model is one in which outcomes are precisely determined through known relationships among states and events, without any room for random variation. In such models, a given input will always produce the same output, such as in a known chemical reaction. In comparison, stochastic models use ranges of values for variables in the form of probability distributions.

DFMA

A product design methodology that provides a quantitative evaluation of product designs.

DGI

Those items that have been returned have been delivered damaged and have a freight claim outstanding or have been damaged in some way during warehouse handling.

DHS

Cabinet-level department in the United States government responsible for protecting the United States from terrorist attacks and natural disasters.

Dial Up

Access a network by dialing a phone number or initiating a computer to dial the number. The dial-up line connects to the network access point via a node or a PAD.

Differential

A discount offered by a carrier that faces a service time disadvantage over a route.

Differentiation

In the postponement supply chain model, this is the point where an end product assumes unique characteristics through final assembly configuration and/or packaging.

Digital Signature

Electronically generated, digitized (as opposed to graphically created) authorization that is uniquely linkable and traceable to an empowered officer.

Direct Channel

Your own sales force sells to the customer. Your entity may ship to the customer, or a third party may handle shipment, but in either case, your entity owns the sales contract and retains rights to the receivable from the customer.

Direct Cost

A cost that can be directly traced to a cost object since a direct or repeatable cause-and-effect relationship exists. A direct cost uses a direct assignment or cost causal relationship to transfer costs. Direct costs can consist of materials used and labor directly involved in production. Also, see Indirect Cost and Tracing.

Direct Debit (DD)

A method of ACH collection is used when the debtor gives authorization to debit his or her account upon the receipt of an entry issued by a creditor. See also automated clearinghouse.

Directed Tasks

Tasks that can be completed based on detailed information provided by the computer system. An order picking task, where the computer details the specific item, location, and quantity to pick, is an example of a directed task.

Direct Production Material

Material that is used in the manufacturing/content of a product (for example, purchased parts, solder, SMT glues, adhesives, mechanical parts, etc., bill-of-materials parts, etc.).

Direct product profitability (DPP)

Calculation of the net profit contribution attributable to a specific product or product line.

Direct Retail Locations

A retail location that purchases products directly from your organization or responding entity.

Direct Store Delivery (DSD)

The process of shipping directly from a manufacturer's plant or distribution center to the customer's retail store, thus bypassing the customer's distribution center, is called Direct-to-Store Delivery.

Direct-to-Store (DTS) Delivery

Same as direct store delivery.

Direct Transmission

A transmission whereby data is exchanged directly between sender and receiver computers, without an intervening third-party service, is called a point-to-point transmission.

DISA

The secretariat provides clerical and administrative support to the ASC X12 Committee.

Disaster Recovery Planning

Contingency planning specifically relates to the recovery of hardware and software, such as data centers, application software, operations, personnel, and telecommunications, during information system outages.