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Tackling Complexity with Transparency in Supply Chain

Posted on 25 May, 20254 August, 2025 by Peter MacLeod

Transparency of the global supply chain is becoming the weapon of choice for smart logistics operations, as Peter MacLeod discovers in a conversation with Setlog’s Ralf Düster.

As the supply chain world hurtles toward a more interconnected and complex future, it is clear that end-to-end visibility is a necessity. Ralf Düster (pictured below), Managing Director of Setlog GmbH, advocates that managing global supply chains effectively means seeing the whole picture, from raw material readiness to last-mile delivery. And with the company’s digital platform, OSCA Global Logistics, Setlog is equipping its customers with the tools to navigate an increasingly unpredictable logistics landscape.

In a recent conversation following Setlog’s appearance at LogiMAT, Düster broke down how Setlog’s approach aligns with the top 10 supply chain management trends of 2025, as outlined in its latest industry report. From AI to cybersecurity, labour shortages to sustainability, he explained how Setlog is helping customers prepare for tomorrow’s challenges today.

End-to-End Visibility

At the core of Setlog’s value proposition is deep visibility across the entire supply chain. “Today, it’s not enough to know where a container is,” says Düster. “You need to know when production starts, what the quality control results are, and if your materials are available in time. That’s the level of granularity we offer.”

Setlog’s OSCA platform allows businesses to gain SKU-level visibility very early in the development cycle, all the way up to the packing stage. Here, an electronic packing list generated at the factory enables accurate, real-time insights long before goods are shipped. This means DCs can prioritise container unloading, prepare resources more effectively, and ultimately serve their customers faster and with greater accuracy.

Ralf Duester, Setlog

Responding to Disruption

In a world rocked by geopolitical tension, climate events, and port congestion, supply chain disruptions are inevitable. Düster isn’t in the business of predicting wars or volcanic eruptions – “I’m not a Trump advisor or a volcano specialist,” he jokes – but he is in the business of building resilience through data. “When production delays happen, our system alerts you early,” he explains. “You can then make decisions like adapting the production, upgrading from sea freight to air freight or arranging two-driver express trucks to reduce delays. You don’t wait until the goods are on the water, you act at the production stage.”

By integrating supplier, lab, and logistics data into one collaborative platform, OSCA empowers businesses to adapt quickly and communicate changes to stakeholders, from internal planners to end customers.

Sustainability & Carbon Reporting

One of the most critical priorities for modern supply chains is reducing carbon emissions. Setlog’s platform offers detailed CO₂ tracking not just by shipment, but by SKU. This enables brands to analyse the environmental impact of individual products or ranges, helping them make greener logistics choices and meet evolving reporting standards.

“Companies can use this information to optimise transport modes, maybe to send mission-critical parts by air, and everything else by sea,” says Düster. “We give them the data to reduce emissions and maintain service levels.” With cyberattacks on the rise, Düster emphasises that Setlog invests heavily in security. “We’re handling sensitive data such as pricing, designs, product images, so we’ve built robust systems with strict access controls,” he says.

The platform is designed with role-based permissions, ensuring that only authorised users can view or modify specific data. Setlog also works with certified European and American data processing partners to maintain the highest security standards. As the supply chain becomes more digital and connected, this kind of protection is essential.

Labour Shortages

Another looming challenge is the growing scarcity of skilled logistics personnel, particularly in customs, warehouse operations, and intralogistics. Setlog is tackling this by supporting the shift toward Fourth-Party Logistics (4PL) models, where a single provider manages and orchestrates the full logistics operation on behalf of the customer.

“Companies want to focus on their core business: making products and serving customers,” says Düster. “They don’t want to worry about customs clearance or warehouse management. That’s where 4PL comes in.” Setlog is currently supporting the development of such a model for its customer Rhenus, a major logistics provider. The goal is full orchestration of everything from carrier selection to distribution centre operations, allowing businesses to remain agile even with fewer in-house logistics professionals.

AI Where it Matters

While many companies claim to use AI, few apply it where it counts. At Setlog, artificial intelligence is being embedded directly into operational workflows. From automated document processing to AI chatbots that answer real-time supply chain questions, OSCA is learning from every user interaction.

“We’re using AI to read laboratory QC reports and automatically trigger workflows,” explains Düster. “We’re also launching chatbot support so users can ask questions like ‘Is this order on the vessel?’ and get instant, accurate answers.” This reduces the need for manual intervention and allows merchandisers and logistics coordinators to focus on exception handling, rather than chasing routine updates.

While Setlog is headquartered in Germany, its footprint and its competitive mindset is international. “The US market is ahead in some areas, especially in adopting digital-first logistics platforms,” says Düster. “But we’re learning fast, and building solutions for both European and American clients.”

He points to the company’s involvement in the Open Logistics Foundation, and its participation in recent hackathons focused on digital air waybills and delivery documents. These innovations are helping reduce manual work and increase speed, which are two major drivers of supply chain efficiency.

The supply chain of 2025 demands more than fragmented software and Excel spreadsheets. It requires an integrated, collaborative ecosystem, one that gives all stakeholders the data they need to act quickly and intelligently. The OSCA platform offers that ecosystem, combining real-time visibility, intelligent automation, and robust security in a single solution. “If you want to be ready for the unknowns, whatever form they take, you need transparency and collaboration,” says Düster.

In an industry defined by complexity and change, that kind of clarity may be the most valuable cargo of all.

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Lampenwelt Brings Light into the Supply Chain

Posted on 2 August, 202424 July, 2025 by Keith McKinley

When it comes to ordering lights online, many consumers make the final click at Lampenwelt. The e-commerce specialist, which is part of the LUQOM Group, recently started using the SCM software OSCA to bring transparency to the supply chain. As a result lead times and the workload for orders have been significantly.

“In addition to simple user guidance, Setlog convinces with its fast implementation,” says Patrick Keyser, Director Demand & Order Management, Global Forwarding, Lampenwelt GmbH. Anyone moving into a new home has a lot to do. Packing, moving, unpacking, assembling furniture and then lots of paperwork. Often there are only temporary light bulbs hanging from the ceiling in the new apartment. Replacing these is also on the to-do list. In the past, people would rush to large furniture stores and often spend half a Saturday in the lamp department to find a new lamp and the right light bulb for each room. But in the age of the Internet, many consumers do away with such time-consuming activities: Instead, they shop for their desired lamps online from the comfort of their new sofa.

For more than two decades, Lampenwelt from the Sauerland region of Germany has been one of the largest and most successful platforms for the sale of lamps of all price ranges. The company sells its products in 27 countries via various domains, including lights.co.uk in the UK and luminaire.fr in France. The online pure player, which is part of the Berlin-based LUQOM Group founded in 2017, offers a range of around 450 brands and more than 60,000 products. Lampenwelt is the nucleus of LUQOM. The LUQOM Group was extended by the strategic acquisition of Lampemesteren from Denmark in 2021 and the acquisition of the QLF Group in 2019, the online market leader in Benelux.

The associated sales growth also brought challenges – in all three of LUQOM’s business divisions: Services, brands including own brands and the e-commerce business. “Without a cutting-edge IT landscape, companies in the consumer goods sector can no longer be successful today,” emphasizes Patrick Keyser, Director Demand & Order Management, Global Forwarding at Lampenwelt. The retail expert has years of experience in digitalization in the fashion sector. Since 2022, he has been transferring his knowledge to the lighting and smart home products sector with the help of his team. His goal: to bring light into the darkness of the supply chain.

Darkness is an exaggeration, of course. Until now, the ordering process had been handled via email to the group’s branch in Asia, LUQOM Asia. The employees took care of purchasing from the Asian suppliers. “On one hand, the effort involved via Excel and email is huge. On the other hand, changes in production or delivery times pose challenges because the supply chain is not transparent,” reports Keyser.

He therefore tackled the project ‘introduction of SCM software’ quickly. From his previous position, he had fond memories of the cloud-based tool OSCA from the Bochum-based software company Setlog: “In addition to simple user guidance, the provider convinces with its quick implementation,” emphasizes Keyser. After consultations with Setlog Managing Director Ralf Duester and an analysis of other providers, the contract was signed in August 2022 and the project launched immediately. The first project milestone by December was to connect and train LUQOM Asia (30 employees) and all Chinese manufacturers of Lampenwelt’s own brands to OSCA SCM. The same applied for the two existing logistics partners. In a second step, the remaining suppliers from Europe and other countries – such as Turkey – will be integrated into the system so that OSCA SCM is used by more than 200 suppliers.

• OSCA SCM contains four service areas for LUQOM Group:
• Delivery Planning & Dialogues: This is where the purchase orders are confirmed by the suppliers.
• Booking & Shipment: This involves the suppliers’ transport booking process with the freight forwarders, the storage of shipment data (manually or via TMS connection) by the logistics service providers and the upload of mandatory documents.
• Delivery to DC: This is where the delivery process at the warehouse is controlled. The forwarder and warehouse employees coordinate the time of goods delivery.
• Reporting: Here, the system offers comprehensive reporting and analysis functions.

According to Keyser, the software was implemented quickly – just as planned. Training in German, English and Chinese also took just two weeks. Some employees and partners initially found it a little difficult to get used to the new workflows. “But anyone who recognizes the advantages also understands the change. OSCA brings transparency to the supply chain. There is now only one central system for communication and document exchange for everyone involved,” says Keyser. For him, there is no alternative to a ‘digital twin of the supply chain’.

Whether ‘Lindby’ ceiling lights or ‘Arcchio’ wall lights: Five employees in Keyser´s team can already manage 2.5 million orders per year via OSCA in the first stage of expansion. The products from Lampenwelt’s own brand are delivered via two logistics service providers to a multi-user warehouse with a total area of 45,000 square meters near Fulda, which is managed by a contract logistics provider, as well as to the company’s own distribution center, which is also located in Hesse.

Although OSCA has only been in operation since December 2022 and the connection of the remaining suppliers is yet to follow, SCM expert Keyser is already excited by two results: Lead times have been reduced by around 15 percent. The company has achieved even better results when it comes to reducing the amount of work involved in ordering lamps and the like: Keyser was able to measure around 20 percent. He anticipates a reduction of up to 50 percent – after the end of the second expansion phase. “The solution has also been well received by the retail specialists in Asia. Our Asian colleagues also benefit from the centralized solution in terms of data exchange and communication. A large number of emails are now a thing of the past,” says Ludger Tillmann, General Manager of LUQOM Asia.

Although the current project is not yet finished, Keyser is already working on others – the connection of other subsidiaries such as QLF and Lampemesteren to OSCA. The interfaces will be implemented shortly. Light should therefore soon be shed on the other supply chains.

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Fashion Transparency: China to Germany

Posted on 1 June, 202331 July, 2025 by David Priestman

When it comes to manufacturing high-quality fashion, Walbusch Group relies on Polymax Group, among others. The Chinese manufacturer under German management collaborates via the SCM software OSCA with the fashion specialist to bring transparency into the supply chain. At the same time, users of the tool save a lot of time because they are more effective without having to use tedious Excel lists, e-mail traffic and phone calls.

Three stories, large windows, white facade: From the outside, the Polymax Group factory in the Chinese coastal city of Ningbo could also be located somewhere in Germany. Only the company sign in Chinese characters indicates that the building is located in China.

Wolfram Geuting tries to spend at least two days a week in this factory. Fashion, or more precisely high-quality clothing, shoes, and accessories, are the passion of the CEO of Polymax Group. The German manager wants to be close to production, to the people who produce for him and his customers. That’s why the Asia expert, who pulls the strings for the company from his office in the business metropolis of Shanghai, likes to travel to Ningbo, which has a population of nine million. Ningbo is an ideal location for export-oriented fashion production: it is home to the most important Chinese port.

Geuting is well known in the industry: He has worked for Steilmann SE and NTS, among others. He feels at home in China. Since June 2022, the German has driven in another peg – as Managing Partner of Polymax Group, which was founded in the early 1980s by entrepreneur Ulrich Maeder. The now 73-year-old chairman is no stranger to the industry either. For more than 40 years, he has been regarded as a pioneer of German-Chinese economic relations and sustainable production in China: As early as 2001, the Zhejiang Province awarded him the “Golden Magnolia Prize” for the “most socially responsible factory.”

Fair payment, compliance with environmental and social standards: According to Geuting, the fact that the Polymax Group did everything in its power to meet the highest standards in human, environmental and occupational health and safety laws decades before the introduction of the Supply Chain Act in Germany is one of the company’s success factors. “Add to that the high-quality standards and on-time deliveries,” the manager said. Customers who knock on his door place the highest value on quality and sustainability seals. ISO 9001 in quality is standard. In addition, the company is listed with the Fair Wear Foundation and BSCI. The group also complies with the OEKO-TEX Standard 100.

Even though worker-friendly overtime regulations, modern production machinery and fair wages impact the profit margin, Geuting cannot think of any alternative. “We can report to our customers that 80 percent of our employees have been with the company for more than 18 years,” he explains. Some men and women have spent their entire working lives at Polymax – and 25 even live in a wing of the factory. They benefit not only from the fact that they have no commute to work, but also from the extremely inexpensive housing: they pay only the ancillary costs.

The success story in Ningbo has now been going on for almost three decades. 210 employees work in the factory. In addition, there are more than 30 in the various offices. Over the years, entrepreneur Ulrich Maeder has not only established offices in Macau and Shanghai, but also in Bangalore (India) and Dhaka (Bangladesh). In Ho Chi Ming City (Vietnam), two experts work in quality assurance. And in London and St. Augustin near Bonn, employees are active in customer acquisition.

Outdoor jackets, cashmere sweaters, silk shirts: the production of high-quality clothing has long since ceased to be the group’s only area of business. Experts also work in quality assurance, procurement services and executive consulting. In order to supply around 8.3 million garments per year to what are now 33 customers, the factory in Ningbo is no longer sufficient. Polymax cooperates with 18 other producers in Asia, the majority of which are located in China, three manufacturers in Bangladesh, two in Vietnam and one in India. Because the company has spun a large network and built up a lot of know-how and technology, it also acts as an agency for some customers. “For small customers, we offer a complete package – from fashion design to delivery. Then all they need is an office and a warehouse,” Geuting reports.
High sustainability standards, high quality, high delivery reliability: the Polymax strategy (“we don’t want to be the biggest, but we want to be the best”) is appreciated by brands of the Walbusch Group, the outdoor clothing specialist Schoeffel, the equestrian fashion supplier Ariat, the fashion label Carlo Collucci and the management of FC Bayern. For the latter, Polymax produces many items for the fan shop – from shoe bags with FCB logos to backpacks.

Polymax is regularly attested top performance – not in terms of quantity, but in terms of quality and reliability. Schöffel, for example, awarded the company “Supplier of the Year” in 2016 and 2018. “If you want to stay at a high level, you have to keep investing in technologies to stay at the cutting edge,” says Geuting. This applies to production equipment just as much as it does to the software landscape, for example.
There is news to report from the IT department: At the beginning of 2023, Polymax Group started working with the SCM software OSCA from the Bochum-based software house Setlog. Geuting was already familiar with the web-based tool when the IT experts at Walbusch Group in Solingen approached him about introducing the software.

The Walbusch Group has been using OSCA DC (Digital Core) from Setlog since the end of 2021 to gain transparency in the supply chain and improve management, collaboration, and communication. The special thing about this: Walbusch Group was the first Setlog customer to rely on the new standard version of OSCA. This means that the processes of the Walbusch, Avena and Mey&Edlich brands were adapted to best practice examples from OSCA – and not vice versa. In this way, the group bypassed costly, customer-specific adjustments in the OSCA SCM software. The advantage: In addition to avoiding costs, the company saved time above all. Less than six months elapsed from the initial contact to the start-up of the software.

“We definitely wanted to avoid customer-specific adaptations and were able to bring transparency into the supply chain within a few months with the new software generation. We can inform our most important suppliers of changes in real time via a single tool. E-mails, phone calls and Excel spreadsheets are now a thing of the past,” reports Ralf Seggering, Head of IT and member of the management team at the long-established company. With Polymax, Walbusch Group integrated one of its main suppliers into the system. Other suppliers and forwarders of the company also work on the software.

According to Geuting, connecting as a supplier to the cloud-based software OSCA was done “in no time.” He downloaded the app, received a link and a password. Then, step by step, the functions Walbusch Group needed were unlocked, he said. “The three people who were to work with OSCA were already looking forward to it because they knew that annoying Excel lists, emails and phone calls would be eliminated from now on. Thanks to OSCA, there will also be no more discussions about who is to blame for a delay, for example,” reports Geuting. Just four hours of online training were necessary and the employees were able to start using the tool.

Walbusch Group’s strategy is that only Polymax should be the central contact for OSCA. Polymax therefore acts as supplier and agency for the German customer. The employees in China also maintain the data of Polymax partners in the system – the information is extensive. The tool is used for the following purposes, among others:
– the placement purchase orders,
– monitoring, controlling, and tracking of purchase orders,
– as a network between customer, supplier, carrier, and warehouse locations,
– for digital, collaborative teamwork,
– to manage delivery parameters such as timing and mode of transport, and
– as a database for important documents such as customs-related records.

All data is clearly visualized on OSCA’s dashboard. Walbusch Group benefits from the transparency and real-time control of supply chain partners. Polymax appreciates that- and less working time, too. Geuting calculated at least 20 percent time savings by using the software for each employee. Users are already asking him whether new customers use OSCA – or still operate with less convenient, proprietary systems or even still rely on Excel and e-mail in SCM. Employees have a clear preference, and so does Geuting. “I can recommend OSCA to buyers.”

Wenko Focuses on IT Transformation

Posted on 17 February, 202329 July, 2025 by David Priestman

Whether it’s a shower basket, ironing board or cutting board: when it comes to household goods, Wenko is the first place to go for many. To bring transparency into the supply chain and be more agile, the company introduced the SCM software OSCA. The family-owned business uses it to manage 145 suppliers and other supply chain partners.

Nothing is as constant as change. This proverb is the secret of success for many companies. This is also the case for the household goods specialist Wenko-Wenselaar GmbH & Co. KG, better known as the Wenko brand. In 1959, entrepreneur Wietze Wenselaar and his wife Maria Koellner founded a company which launched the first metallized ironing board cover in Germany.
However, achieving major growth was not possible with just ironing articles alone. The founder’s son, Hans-Joachim Koellner, therefore significantly expanded the product range after joining the family business in 1968. From then on, Wenko’s business no longer revolved mainly around laundry and ironing, but also included bathroom accessories, home storage solutions and other household helpers. Business boomed.

Today, the company from Hilden near Düsseldorf offers more than 5,000 articles from the areas of lingerie, bathroom, living, kitchen, and leisure – with patents or property rights for around 1,500 products. With Niklas Koellner and his brother Philip, the third generation joined the family business around two decades ago. The two are also pursuing new ideas. In 2020, they acquired the mail-order supplier Maximex from Lower Saxony, which supplemented the product range with its products.

To keep up in the tough price war, Wenko’s goods are manufactured all over the world in Eastern Europe, Spain, France, Germany, and Asia. More than 200 suppliers are listed with the company. Five freight forwarders deliver around 4,000 shipments to North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany. Most of the deliveries are stored in two buffer warehouses, each with 20,000 pallet spaces. The hub for shipments to 81 countries – with the focus on Europe – is the Wenko central warehouse in Hückelhoven. It was opened in 1997. In 2017, the family-owned company invested in the semi-automation of the warehouse, which now covers more than 35,000 square meters. The high-bay warehouse comprises 34,000 pallet spaces. During peak season, up to 50,000 picks can now be carried out – per day.

Keeping track of all orders and shipments is not easy. Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, Excel lists and emails were the main communication aids with supply chain partners. But Covid threw supply chains into turmoil. Suppliers couldn’t deliver, ships couldn’t leave their ports. As with many companies, goods often flowed hesitantly, but emails were frantic. “The Covid-19 pandemic led to the realization that we needed to change in the supply chain space. Production and delivery delays were almost impossible to handle manually,” reports Wenko Managing Director Niklas Koellner. “In order to be able to control production and transport, we wanted to bring transparency into the supply chain with the help of a central tool. This should then inform all partners about changes at the same time.”

No sooner said than done. Koellner and the supply chain management team looked around for tools at the end of 2021. They found what they were looking for with the SCM software specialist Setlog. More than 150 brands worldwide now use the OSCA solution to manage their supply chains. “The decisive factor for the provider was that the best-practice version, which has been tried and tested at other companies, is easy to use and enables optimal control of logistics processes,” explains Koellner. The first meeting took place at the end of February 2022, and the system went live at the end of July.

Since then, Wenko has been transmitting orders from their ERP system to its suppliers via OSCA. 145 of a total of 200 partners are connected to the system, which accounts for more than 85 percent of the total volume. Four of the five forwarding agents also work with OSCA. The software acts as a central communication and control tool – from order confirmation and delivery planning to booking shipments and transports. In addition to costs, volumes, lead and transport times, post-carriage control, carton packing lists including label creation and delivery dates can also be controlled. The forwarders enter transport notifications and tracking data into OSCA.

At the headquarters in the Rhineland, a dashboard visualizes the most important key figures for the nine Wenko employees who are connected to the cloud-based system. When production or delivery data changes, all supply chain partners are notified simultaneously. “Monitoring has improved greatly. Production backlogs, for example, can be easily called up in the dashboard,” Koellner says. Even colleagues’ vacations no longer pose a challenge because everyone involved can track the processes in the system through central communication. Implementation and training took a few days. But the advantages of a transparent supply chain quickly made up for that for Wenko: “There are no more media disruptions – and changes in orders and shipments are immediately visible to everyone,” Koellner emphasizes.

And there are now more and more disruptions – due to political crises, strikes, environmental disasters or pandemics. “If a consumer goods manufacturer today cannot rely on a modern IT landscape – with SCM solution, ERP, CAD, WMS, PLM, payment system as well as production planning – it is quickly overwhelmed with the challenges of our time,” says Ralf Duester, board member of Setlog. According to him, the most important trends in the industry include increasing complexity in procurement and distribution, the shift from push to pull markets, the acceleration of ordering processes in companies, and the growing need for additional services. “Wenko shows how an innovative mid-sized company with 550 employees is embracing change and has prepared for the future with a modern IT infrastructure, dedicated IT experts and collaborative supply chain partners. And with the planned integration of Shippeo’s Visibility Tool into the running OSCA solution, Wenko will additionally be able to track its shipments in real time, adding further value to logistics,” explains Duester.