Logistics 5.0: the ultimate transition to the digital world

If the last decade has been dominated by logistics 4.0 and all the technologies associated with it, since 2020 a new period marked by the 5.0 paradigm has begun.
Digitalization, robotization and massive data management, which characterized the previous phase, continue to play a leading role, but now focus directly and fundamentally on human beings.
Like the 5.0 organizational models, logistics places the customer as the main vertex of any business, since it understands the customer as the final consumer or the next link in the supply chain.
Any digital transformation places the human talent of each supply chain at the center.
Talent is carefully nurtured and empowered in the design, planning or execution of any activity in the industry.
This is one of the two main differences between logistics 4.0 and 5.0.
This is what Juan Antonio Marco says in his book Logística 5.0, which has become a manual for the adaptation and implementation of this new logistics.
A text that today we echo to shed some light on this new phase for many unknown.
According to Marco, the second major difference is the clear commitment to value chains 5.0, designed, directed and managed by data.
Data becomes a fundamental part of the strategy and operations of supply chains, “enabling them to act productively in the face of any disruption that affects them and not reactively, as they have been doing until now.

Characteristics of the new consumer

The author considers that the traditional logistics model is exhausted for two main reasons: the customer has changed and will continue to change and the logistics service has become an added value to the product.
The millennial customer is already a reality and the characteristics that define him are shaping the market:

• All your contacts and followers have a direct link to your experiences, both negative and positive.
• More than 70% of customers do not repeat if they have a negative shopping experience.
• Globalization.
  The origin of the product does not matter.
• Unconditional of eCommerce.
  Total confidence in electronic shopping.
• Search for immediate gratification.
  They want it now.
• Personalization of the product or service.
  Avoid standardization.

Therefore, customers will value logistics positively if it is able to improve their shopping experience.
Millennial consumers use any tool or device to access products or services, which is why it is essential for logistics services to be visible on any platform or device.

Technologies that will characterize logistics 5.0

In order to undertake this transformation towards 5.0 logistics, Marco delves into some of the technology stakes that will be indispensable.

1. Internet of things (IoT) andcloud computing.
   IoT is a set of technological tools that nourish big data systems and make all the components or agents that influence the supply chain potential issuers of information, which can be used by other technologies to increase the chain’s visibility and facilitate subsequent decision making.
   Cloud computing, for its part, allows immediate and flexible access to technological options for managing information and large volumes of data, with hardly any limitation on virtual storage.
2. It is a system of highly encrypted records, which in logistics is used to increase confidence in the data between the agents interacting in the chain.
3. Augmented virtual reality.
   A set of intelligent devices that add real-time visual information to existing physical information.
   It can be applied to facility design, product location processes, inventories or training in the use of machinery or logistics tools.
4. Robots created to work with humans in the production line or in any logistic environment of the organization.
5. The main advantage of these unmanned aerial devices is their easy access to difficult places that other conventional means of transport cannot reach.
   In addition, they have zero polluting effect.
6. Artificial Intelligence.
   The application of AI is the result of using all the previous technologies together with big data.
   Its main objective is to provide a set of useful data and information, which feeds AI systems to make accurate decisions and as accurate as possible within all the alternatives that are offered to us.
   AI is vital for one of the logistics fields with the greatest room for development: e-commerce.

How to drive human factor excellence

Although strategies and scientific methods are important for this new logistics, the determining factor that has a decisive influence on its success or failure is the human factor.
According to Marco in his book, “excellence in the human factor is achieved by strengthening three pillars: the promotion of talent, dynamic collaboration and cultural, operational and sustainable leadership (COS)”.
The promotion of talent refers to continuous training, as well as a multidisciplinary, horizontal and transparent management model, which adapts to teleworking and work-life balance.
As for dynamic collaboration, Marco refers to the efficiency and effectiveness of the value chain as a shared challenge among several organizations.
If one part of the process works well but the whole is deficient, the objectives will not be achieved.
Finally, COS leadership is based on generating a culture of change, with flexible structures, with leaders who are fully aware of the processes and data-driven management, as well as of the need to take care of the environment[:].