Session Recap: Customer-Centric Supply Chain Strategy: Key Takeaways from Opeyemi Odusami at LogiPharma
During LogiPharma 2025, Opeyemi Odusami, Former Associate Director of Global Supply Chain at Sanofi, delivered a keynote presentation on "Maximizing Profitability & Agility: Customer-Centric Supply Chain." The session brought together key themes from the conference to demonstrate how end-to-end supply chain alignment directly impacts customer satisfaction, brand sustainability, and operational efficiency. For pharmaceutical and biotech leaders navigating increasingly complex supply chains, this presentation offered practical frameworks for balancing customer needs with profitability.
Key Takeaways
1. On-Time In Full (OTIF) is the Foundation of Customer Trust
OTIF measurement should be implemented at every stage of the supply chain, from raw material sourcing through finished goods delivery. This KPI tracks the percentage of goods delivered completely and on schedule, serving as a critical signal for supply chain health. When OTIF percentages drop, it indicates underlying issues that require immediate investigation and corrective action across your supply chain strategy.
2. Demand Planning Accuracy Prevents Cascading Failures
Accurate demand forecasting eliminates bias and serves as the starting point for all downstream supply chain decisions. Internal factors like governance alignment and data accuracy, combined with external considerations such as regulatory constraints, must be factored into planning. Digital tools play an essential role in improving forecast precision and ensuring production teams understand market realities in real time.
3. Capacity Planning Requires Dedicated Cross-Functional Teams
A dedicated capacity planning team should focus on building both constrained and unconstrained demand scenarios. Large gaps between these forecasts signal underlying problems that need escalation to senior leadership through global supply review meetings. This team bridges production capabilities with demand realities, recommending resourcing strategies that optimize manufacturing footprints and ensure efficient product delivery.
4. Material Supply Planning Depends on Strong Supplier Relationships
Supplier partnerships are critical to preventing production stalls and ensuring seamless material flow. Good sourcing strategies, combined with reliable supplier relationships, enable raw materials and critical components to arrive on schedule. This upstream focus prevents disruptions that would otherwise cascade through manufacturing and delay customer deliveries.
5. Strategic Inventory Balancing Protects Against Supply Crises
Industry best practice recommends maintaining approximately four months of safety stock at each inventory node, from drug substance, drug products, and finished goods. This buffer provides roughly one month of protection against supply disruptions while balancing cash flow and profitability. Detailed scheduling and inventory planning ensure you maintain optimal stock levels that satisfy both financial and customer service objectives.
6. Customer-Centric Mindset Drives Long-Term Brand Value
Fostering a customer-centric culture throughout the supply chain builds loyalty and strengthens relationships. While inventory decisions involve trade-offs between liability reduction and brand protection, prioritizing customer needs ultimately protects company reputation. Balancing cost savings with service excellence ensures sustainable competitive advantage in a rapidly evolving market.
7. Continuous Improvement and Diverse Talent Enable Transformation
Supply chain excellence requires embracing continuous improvement culture and recruiting talent with diverse backgrounds in finance, operations, and business strategy. As the industry transforms with digitalization and advanced therapies, teams must adapt quickly and think creatively. Investing in people and fostering a learning mindset prepares organizations for future challenges.
Why It Matters
Pharmaceutical and biotech leaders face mounting pressure to deliver advanced therapies faster while maintaining quality and managing costs. Odusami's framework addresses this tension by demonstrating that customer-centric supply chain strategies are not obstacles to profitability, they are enablers of it. When organizations align operations with customer expectations, they reduce waste, prevent costly disruptions, and build brand loyalty that translates to market share. In an industry where supply shortages directly impact patient outcomes, the ability to deliver products on time and in full is both a business imperative and a patient safety issue. The session underscored that success requires integration across demand planning, capacity management, supplier relationships, and inventory strategy; no single function can succeed in isolation.
Actionable Insights
- Implement OTIF tracking at every supply chain node: Establish clear visibility into on-time, in-full delivery performance from raw materials through customer delivery to identify and address bottlenecks early.
- Invest in demand planning technology and governance: Deploy digital tools that improve forecast accuracy while ensuring alignment between leadership, market data, and production teams on regulatory constraints.
- Build dedicated capacity planning teams with cross-functional expertise: Create teams that model constrained and unconstrained scenarios, escalate gaps to senior leadership, and recommend resourcing strategies that optimize manufacturing efficiency.
- Establish four-month safety stock targets and monitor inventory health: Balance financial performance with supply chain resilience by maintaining strategic inventory buffers that protect against disruptions while supporting customer service goals.