Digital supply chains and AI: How short-term AI use cases can be quick wins for automotive
Against a backdrop of supply chain disruption and uncertainty, digitalisation offers opportunities to inform data-driven decision-making and there are a number of short-term AI use cases that can deliver valuable quick wins for the automotive sector, from documentation to staying on top of regulatory changes.
Embracing AI doesn't have to mean a complete digital transformation; there are several ways in which AI tools can deliver results without the need for an extensive data clean-up project. During Automotive Logistics' recent 'Digital supply chains: Beyond AI' livestream – sponsored by Loftware – editor Emily Uwemedimo discussed where these quick wins can be achieved with John Rich, director of AI transformation at Mazda North America, and Paul Harris, director of solution consulting at Loftware.
Rich highlighted that when looking for areas that can benefit from short-term AI use cases, it's best to focus on the basics, where data has already been collected – areas like documentation.
"Whether it be internal knowledge management, freight invoices, customs documents or bill of lading (BOL) documents – these are things that are highly structured and they are constantly being reviewed and updated, so most likely a lot of that groundwork has already been done in this area because it's tied to money," Rich explained.
He suggested deploying a system based on retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) to handle tasks such as this. "There's very low risk, there's high visibility and it builds AI literacy organically across your team," he noted. "The data's already there, so the value is immediate."
However, Rich cautioned that if that data is not readily available, this no longer becomes a short-term AI use case, but rather a longer-term transformation project.
Harris highlighted another potential use case for AI that can deliver quick results – tracking regulatory changes in key markets. He explained that by inputting core information on the markets a business serves – things that are unlikely to change –a system can be built to flag upcoming regulatory changes and allow decision-makers to accelerate their preparation for compliance with future regulation.
