Business Weekly - Cambridge, UK

The main hub for the two and a half year contract with AstraZeneca is located in Milton Keynes and is for the centralised planning and primary distribution of pharmaceutical products from its manufacturing sites throughout Europe into its continental distribution network.

It will bring together the distribution operations of AstraZeneca’s European manufacturing plants for the first time.

They previously operated independently and were responsible for their own transportation.

Using NYK’s established pan-European network of road transport partners, the operation involves the temperature-controlled distribution of almost 50,000 pallets of product per annum from 10 manufacturing plants across the UK, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and Sweden to 30 delivery points throughout Europe.

Of the 22 companies invited to tender for the business, NYK was the only one not to be an existing AstraZeneca supplier.

NYK said its ability to not only meet, but exceed, AstraZeneca’s requirements through its existing pan-European pharmaceutical network, an established centralised planning hub, understanding of the pharmaceutical supply chain and track record in delivering continuous improvement, swung the decision in its favour.

James Shaw (Global Category Lead Freight & Logistics) of AstraZeneca said: “We were impressed by NYK’s approach to the tender process – their solution went beyond our initial requirements and demonstrated a high level of added value, along with an understanding of the importance of quality, integrity and audit control in the pharmaceutical supply chain.

“At both a cultural and operational level, NYK recog-nised that the new approach would represent a major challenge for many of our manufacturing plants and established a dedicated implementation team to ensure a seamless transition to the new system, including a dedicated relationship manager to ensure maximum confidence and co-operation from every site.”

Under the new agreement, NYK is providing centralised management and planning of the entire pan-European road transportation operation, maximising co-loading and round trip opportunities and delivering substantial cost savings and environmental benefits.

The solution also allows AstraZeneca to leverage the best rates from the whole of the European market whilst the introduction of common operating and security standards will ensure consistently high quality levels across all AstraZeneca’s European sites.

NYK is also developing co-loading opportunities with other pharmaceutical manufacturers within the existing NYK European network, delivering further cost savings and environmental improvements.

In the longer term, the development of a pharmaceutical cross-dock network will support the transformation of AstraZeneca’s supply chain from ‘push’ to ‘pull’, reducing inventory in the pipeline and providing a more responsive service to customers.

NYK Logistics is a global provider of integrated supply chain solutions, offering a unique combination of services, supported by sea, air, road and rail resources and a worldwide network of over 110 large-scale storage, consolidation and dist-ribution centres.

Supported by the $16.4bn NYK group, NYK Logistics creates fully dedicated or shared-user operations for customers looking to achieve specific supply chain requirements – irrespective of size, complexity or fluidity.