The Sarbanes-Oxley Act created new standards for corporate accountability pertaining to all publicly-owned and traded firms. It holds top executives accountable for the accuracy of all financial data and statements, including reported tangible assets. It requires existence of auditable internal accounting control measures and specifies adherence to new internal controls and procedures designed to ensure the validity of their financial records and physical assets. The Act presents a challenge to every manufacturing firm to have a low-cost system implemented that can produce an exact physical-asset location, existence, verification and accounting on demand. Clearly, such low-cost solutions for enterprise-wide compliance would also provide verifiable and reliable data for corporate property tax, loan collateral, and audit requirements.
In 2011, Chrysler LLC conducted a study for an improved and efficient process to locate, verify and track OEM-owned tooling assets at supplier sites, located across the globe. The collaborative effort focused on an innovative and comprehensive business algorithm (ALEX™), for automotive tooling's “Acquire to Retire” asset locating, tracking and verification. A proof of concept pilot was initiated to evaluate the feasibility and effectiveness of the asset-acquire stage of the ALEX™ Business Algorithm. The initial phase of this pilot was focused on a third party tooling certification/verification and a supply-chain based annual validation alternative. Subsequent development phases will focus on the scalability of the ALEX™ Business Algorithm for new and legacy tooling, as well as capital equipment.
This paper presents the current state of challenges with regards to supply chain asset management and inventory. It also outlines the requirements for a robust asset locating and management system.