In 2009, expect most large WMS and WCS applications to remain dedicated applications tailored to a company's particular business rules, with SOA concepts appearing primarily in the integration interface.

To improve supply chain resiliency, companies need to include risk considerations in their supply chain network design efforts, sales and operations planning, and inventory planning; on the execution side, they need to improve logistics and transportation management, secure alternative supply chain partners, and ensure proactive alerting process and response management for disruptions.

The global credit crunch is jeopardizing the financial health of our supply chains. In 2009, companies should reassess suppliers' financial stability and implement processes to spot operational red flags that are early warning signals of financial stress.

Increased linkage between material and financial flows requires supply chain managers to learn more about topics like working capital optimization, margin and asset utilization, valuation and risk, managerial accounting and cash flows, taxes and transfer prices.

Sales and operations planning is the cornerstone of being demand-driven and a foundational process to propel growth strategies. As companies drive growth-growth in the innovation of new products, growth through expansion into new geographies, and growth in core markets-they must align functions through S&OP.

From government to home solutions, RFID is changing, step by step, our way of working, answering our questions about the world we live in, as well as creating humanitarian solutions that can make a real difference in the lives of those in need. Many negative myths exist about RFID and its applicability, reliability and availability. They are oft repeated by those who have low to no contact with the actual solutions.

RFID is finally becoming the solution that will make integrated supply chain management possible. 2009 promises to be a banner year for the technology, with the introduction of new and more ambitious applications.

In past product lifecycle management research, we asked manufacturers why they think product launches fail-the reason most often cited was that the product doesn't meet customer needs. While still within the top three, not meeting customer needs has been replaced in this year's spending study by a new top challenge: higher than projected costs.