Big Data – What is it? Why is it important? How can it impact your supply chain in a big way? These questions are all valid, and may have crossed your mind once or twice, but it’s valuable to understand the reasons such thoughts are so prevalent.

None of these questions should be ignored. If anything, it’s necessary that supply chains accept Big Data, and the benefits that come with it. Make no mistake: Big Data is here to stay.

What Is It?

According to Louis Columbus at Forbes, “Big data is providing supplier networks with greater data accuracy, clarity, and insights, leading to more contextual intelligence shared across supply chains.” Data is all based off the interactions your customers have and how you can use that data to benefit your supply chain. Whether a customer visits your website, purchases a product, or writes a review, all of these interactions can be collected and stored in a meaningful way.

“Big Data is not only the ability to process more information,” writes Edwin Lopez from Supply Chain Dive, “but the ability to innovate, automate and use data for enhanced decision-making.” Big Data has become revolutionary, and utilizing it efficiently will provide accuracy, quality, and speed to your supply chain leading to sufficient operations.

Why Is It Important?

Providing Big Data adds true value within the marketplace. What do I mean by “true value”? Big Data comes from a massive pool of analytical data points provided by online users – but the true value of this data comes from what you do with it. As analytics provider SAS puts it, “Big data can be analyzed for insights that lead to better decisions and strategic business moves.”

Partstat has mastered the use of valuable Big Data in our electronic component supply chain. Our Big Data warehouse has over 50 billion data points from over 5,000 manufacturers and authorized distributors. It’s the largest free big data warehouse for electronic components, semiconductors, and computer products.

This data comes from two primary sources: from our users, and from online data we collect utilizing our status as an open-source platform. Our data pool provides users the ability to list, price, and sell electronic inventory in a real-time market model to get the most value for their dollar. Partstat understands the effect Big Data is having on our supply chain and takes full advantage of it; we recommend you do the same.

How Can It Impact Your Supply Chain in a Big Way?

When you think of Big Data, think of Big Benefits. Our goal is to maximize the potential of this resource to find answers to questions that have stumped supply chain professionals for years. It can help reduce production costs, minimize the effects of disruptions, and even provide new product development and optimized offerings.

To quote SAS’s analytics thought-leader, Thomas H. Davenport, “It’s important to remember that the primary value from Big Data comes not from the data in its raw form, but from the processing and analysis of it and the insights, products, and services that emerge from analysis. The sweeping changes in Big Data technologies and management approaches need to be accompanied by similarly dramatic shifts in how data supports decisions and product/service innovation.”

Take it from us, after helping OEMs around the world adopt Big Data into their supply chains, we have been able to provide value for our customers never before seen in the industry. Partstat is a free online marketplace without restrictions, boundaries, or borders, and that’s the way we like it.

To see just how Big our Big Data really is, click here.