The “Phy-Gital” Supply Chain with WayCool Labs
By Avinash Kasinathan
Over the years, the role of technology in business has evolved from being a business enabler to a business driver. This is why so many new-age companies are labelled “tech startups” or “e-commerce players.” Tech, which earlier was merely a function, has started taking the spotlight from the physical sector in which the company is actually operating.
However, at least for any supply chain company, the optimum solution for disruptive yet scalable and profitable growth lies somewhere in between the physical and digital worlds — when the intelligent application of tech is complemented by equal advancement and innovation in the core physical operations. Why an Amazon stands above others is not solely due to the fact that they have a robust tech stack, but also because their supply chain and distribution operations are built with an equally disruptive mindset. At WayCool, we call this the “Phy-Gital” supply chain.
“The Phy-Gital supply chain — The intersection between lean physical operational efficiency and groundbreaking applications of next gen digital technologies.”
When WayCool Labs, the tech arm of WayCool, started, we sat down to define the underlying focus of our tech innovations. There were many potential applications and technologies which came up. At the time most buzzing startups had built their tech stack around convenience to customers — like e-commerce marketplaces or last-mile food delivery or ridesharing platforms. Others focused on optimization algorithms, machine learning, augmented reality, or other analytical elements. However, we believed that in order to solve the core problems in our industry, India’s food supply chain, we needed to think bigger. More “all encompassing” rather than solving specific problems in specific segments alone. With that in mind, we set the following design principles for the WayCool Labs Vision:
a) Soil to sale tracking and control of material, cash, and data
b) Creating information transparency across the ecosystem
c) True parallelism with our physical supply chain
Why these?
There’s a lot of excitement these days around themes of food traceability, logistics optimization, marketplace platforms, etc in the food and agri supply chain. No doubt that they are beneficial. However, do these individually create a long term difference and impact in the supply chain?
For example, is tracing products to farmers enough to declare it safe, without understanding the seeds, inputs, or farming practices that went into cultivating them? For farmers to achieve higher realization, is it enough to provide them with market linkages on an app, or are they more likely to make higher profits if they learn how to optimize a cultivation calendar, what practices improve yield, and how to ascertain the product quality to demand higher prices? India’s food supply chain is complex, and requires an end-to-end solution that adequately addresses each of the supply chain segments. Our vision was stated specifically to recognize this complexity and aims to guide the organization to address this effectively.
What are we building?
WayCool Labs has been developing 3 distinct tech suites to perfectly mirror how we view the actual food supply chain. Cultivation, Operations, and Distribution:
- MyFarm — suite of applications aimed at providing the farmer information transparency and decision-making support from forecast, input advisory, quality, transportation, payments, and access to market linkages
- RAPID — automated “Phy-Gital” supply chain management system to reduce human handling of material and associated human error from soil to sale, ensuring minimal spoilage/wastage along with ensuring a high degree of transparency and traceability back to the source
- Garuda — highly intelligent distribution management system starting from mapping the demand across the market geography to ensuring seamless process of order taking and associated distribution related tasks like collections, order fulfillment, and more
MyFarm — Tech @ Cultivation
This suite is aimed at providing the farmer with everything they need for their crop production. Among many other solutions in the application, MyForecast provides an estimate of the demand situation for different crops and the potential price the crops are likely to get in the market over the medium term. The farmer is also provided advisory starting from soil and water test to weather-based advisory through our iWAP and all-year-around calendar for cultivation and harvesting. MyPrice helps them with the necessary linkages to close the transactions while transportation support is provided through our MyVehicle solution. Additionally, all their historical ledgers are safely saved in the MyTransactions module to ensure transparency and visibility.
These solutions are multi-lingual, and we are also integrating with other familiar platform APIs like WhatsApp for farmers to easily adopt the products. With this suite, the farmer has all the tools required to assist in making the right decisions for their business while we can provide accountability to our consumers about our products right from the soil stage onwards.
RAPID — Tech @ Operations
There are two important elements to reduce wastage, especially with fresh produce — procuring the right quantity at the right time, and ensuring minimal physical handling to avoid damaging them. This is possible for us thanks to our RAPID automation systems. RAPID, which stands for Receiving, Allocation, Packing, Invoicing, and Dispatch, encompasses the end-to-end of warehouse operations. RAPID ensures that our products face minimal handling through the entire process, and seamlessly integrate the digital platform with world-class warehouse automation.
What makes RAPID even more special is that it is a completely in-house frugally built system — which comes at 10% of the cost of similar sophisticated systems used by companies in other countries. Our Innovation team led by Subu Akkulan built the system from scratch as we realized the importance of engineering this process for flexibility and scalability. This enabled us to deploy the same solution across multiple touch points across the country. Given the cost structure of the food supply chain and related margins available, we knew we had to make the most of our team’s ingenuity and spend smartly, not lavishly, despite being funded. In other words, RAPID is WayCool ’s own version of Mangalyaan! Subu and team are now exploring a lights-out warehouse set up, where the entirety of our physical operations in our distribution center can be 100% automated including receiving, quality checking, allocation, and even dispatch. Stay tuned for exciting updates on this.
Garuda — Tech @ Distribution
One of the most critical elements of the food supply chain is managing the last mile distribution. Many distributor management systems exist in the market to this end, but what makes Garuda different is its eagle-eye view of the entire business. From an intelligent analytics engine (Chanakya) for go-to-market study and market share analysis, a seamless GarudaDMS salesman assist system for distribution management, to optimally handling the last mile logistics and returns (Vahana), and even managing the collections and amicably solving disputes (Arya), the Eagle has it all.
This suite is intended to provide accountability in terms of our distribution process, on-time reliable fulfillment, and order traceability. It is also the perfect companion for our sales team for interactions with the retailers from product choices to delivery intimation to a smooth payment reconciliation process.
WayCool Labs is helping build WayCool’s “Phy-Gital” food supply chain with “German efficiency and Japanese simplicity at Indian cost structures,” and that vision will continue to guide us on our journey.
What next?
As always, we know we’re in the middle of a journey moving towards improving every possible aspect of the food supply chain. There’s always more to be done and we are extremely excited about what we can produce next. Here’s a glimpse at what we’re working on now:
PragatiDirect
While MyFarm helps our farmers make the right decisions, PragatiDirect is set up as a single point solution for everything retailers need for stocking their stores. From linking stores to the best vendors for any product that they require, to providing detailed reports on quality and fulfillment, and even helping manage the payment cycles, PragatiDirect supports retailers with the entire supply chain backend to service their end customers.
A solution like this is especially useful in the current circumstances around COVID 19. This suite means that retailers are no longer reliant on salespersons physically visiting their stores and instead have full access to purchase their requirements on their own. For our salespersons as well, it is a contact-free way of doing business with the retailers and keeps them safe while ensuring business continuity. With a Garuda backed distribution process, retailers can confidently order their products on the Pragati Direct application and gain valuable insights in the process.
Retail Suite — For Retail Store Owners and chains
For store owners and supermarket chains, you know the industry is ever-changing as everyone is looking for an upper hand in terms of customer experience or store operations. How can you improve the customer’s shopping experience? Can you use CCTV footage to understand which parts of your store are the busiest, and which are not getting any attention? Do you want to launch a self-checkout counter for customers to do express billing? Are your customers asking for traceability for the fresh produce that they’re buying? Do you want to offer customers a mobile application, in your branding, for customers to place home delivery orders directly with you rather than a marketplace? The time is now to think about we can modernize Modern Trade, and Digitize General Trade, to continue to elevate this industry. As always, continue to watch this space, for what’s coming next.
We’re excited about what we’ve built, but the future is even brighter. With 5 years of learning under our belt, and a deeper understanding of the supply chain and related adoption constraints, we know we can do a lot more. We would love to hear what you think about our solutions, and our approach to technology. Are you interested in working with us on building this Phy-Gital supply chain? Please get in touch.
