Is there anything more critical to the global economy than its food supply? Agribusiness companies bear the signicant responsibility of feeding the world in the midst of incredible volatility. While facing the universal challenges of a sluggish global economy and increasing competition, agribusiness companies encounter incredible risk from climate instability, natural disasters, and growing global markets. This creates a greater need for control as they deal with issues such as: - Short product life cycles - Variable seasons by crop and geography - Genetically modified seeds - Limited suppliers - Regulatory policies - Organic foods

1. INTEGRATED BUSINESS PLANNING FOR AGRIBUSINESS DATA SHEET
Steelwedge Integrated Business Planning
for Agribusiness
Page 1 of 3 | © 2013 Steelwedge Software, Inc. All rights reserved. – info@steelwedge.com – 925.460.1700
Is there anything more critical to the global economy than its food supply?
Agribusiness companies bear the significant responsibility of feeding the world in the
midst of incredible volatility. While facing the universal challenges of a sluggish global
economy and increasing competition, agribusiness companies encounter incredible risk
from climate instability, natural disasters, and growing global markets. This creates a
greater need for control as they deal with issues such as:
These uncertainties require agribusiness companies to more frequently review and adjust
supply plans, demand forecasts, and inventory positions. At the same time, they must
implement approaches that reduce costs without sacrificing quality and customer
satisfaction. To remain successful, you must eliminate siloed processes that restrict your
ability to closely collaborate with suppliers and quickly respond to demand fluctuations.
Leading information technology research and advisory company, Gartner, summarized in a
recent report:
Short product life cycles:
Existing chemical solutions ultimately can become ineffective to pests and diseases that
grow resistant to them.
Variable seasons by crop and geography:
Growing seasons vary by both crop and growing region. Many countries have multiple
seasons per year.
Genetically modified seeds:
As the use of genetically modified seeds grows, the demand for pesticides and fertilizers
could be reduced. These seeds are designed to resist infestation and generate higher
yields with less fertilizer.
Limited suppliers:
A small number of companies maintain the capacity to produce many fertilizer and
pesticide chemicals. This concentrated production network may encourage customers
to find replacement products.
Regulatory policies:
Approval of biotech hybrid seeds vary by country, complicating both supply and market
side planning variables. And, evolving agrichemical technologies complicate supply and
demand variables.
Organic foods:
Organic foods, which restrict the use of pesticides in the production, continue to grow in
popularity. As a result, demand for agricultural chemicals could drop proportionally.
”
“ Market volatility in the chemical industry drives more frequent review and
operating adjustments than a monthly S&OP cycle can support. Leading chemical
companies are synchronizing supply planning and scheduling to enable agile
translation of volatile demand into a profitable response.
Gartner, “The Role of Planning and Scheduling in a Demand-Driven
Chemical Supply Chain Response,” September 2012

2. Page 2 of 3 | © 2013 Steelwedge Software, Inc. All rights reserved. – info@steelwedge.com – 925.460.1700
Role of Integrated Business Planning in Agricultural
Biotechnology Manufacturing
For the Sales Team:
Enable collaborative forecasting for sales reps and sales management
Align crop plan commitments to current year sales plan
Power plans at any level of detail
Integrate with sales pipeline from CRM to support opportunity management
Provide annual operating plan (AOP) visibility as part of S&OP process
View cross-functional demand plans (sales, marketing, product management, etc.)
Access reporting and analytics capabilities including through a mobile platform
For the Product Management Team:
Develop product bundle forecasts to drive mix forecasting for complex chemical products
Forecast using regional requirements to develop products that merge seed characteristics with
crop protection for better results
Provide extended functionality that will support Fixed Bill of Material (BOM), Planning BOMs or
“derived attach” rates for strategic products based on actual history or pipeline
Robust control of planning granularity with intuitive, slider-based data selection
For the Planning Team:
Drive company-specific planning processes with One-Click Planning™ alert-driven workflow
Provide planning process visibility and progress reporting
Drive assigned or exception-based review policies
Integrate with ERP, SCM, CRM and financial systems that widely differ in their taxonomy or
granularity
Establish role-specific planning views, automatic semantic resolution, parent analysis and
user-driven catalogs
Leverage deep domain expertise embedded in reporting and analytics capabilities,
including mobile
The right planning creates an integrated current and future year(s) volume program plan
based on top-down financial budget considerations, global capacity, material restrictions
and customer demand.
Using an integrated technology that provides insight into multiple data sources, you can:
Steelwedge Advantages for Agribusiness
With deep industry expertise and a tool set configurable to the specific requirements of the
industry, Steelwedge offers unique benefits to agribusiness companies. The agribusiness
industry is global and requires the ability to manage big data in the integrated business
planning process. Steelwedge is uniquely positioned to scale to big data levels across global
business units and distribution channels with a large number of products. Steelwedge
provides these role-based capabilities for agribusiness companies:
Manage a global financial budget tied to sales numbers, revenues and operational forecasts
Maintain high-level, global visibility into external demand requirements
Anticipate internal and external supply constraints and react to long lead times for
chemicals
Optimize inventory levels and maximize customer service levels
Assess actual sales and redistribute remaining inventory according to changing demand
Allocate capacity and raw materials across multiple suppliers based on overall capacity
utilization and profits
Introduce new products based on the ebb and flow of weather, seasonality, and crop year
INTEGRATED BUSINESS PLANNING FOR AGRIBUSINESS DATA SHEET

3. Steelwedge Software, Inc.
Steelwedge integrated sales, operations and finance planning solutions provide the "shock absorbers" to recognize, recalibrate and respond in a volatile environment.
Business agility starts with Steelwedge for a clear line of sight from plan to performance to profit. For additional information, please email us: info@steelwedge.com.
Page 3 of 3 | © 2013 Steelwedge Software, Inc. All rights reserved. – info@steelwedge.com – 925.460.1700
Best Practice Spotlight: Global Agribusiness Leader
See data in new ways, including across both seeds and crops, as well as separately
Extract data from the system in real time
Maintain a flexible calendar that enables agility across the ebb and flow of seasonality,
weather and crop year
Redistribute unsold inventory to meet changing demand
Keep up with currency conversions in international business
In recent years, there has been an increase in the hybridization of crops to make them
genetically resistant to threats such as drought, insects, and fungus. This trend served as a
growth driver for a global leader in pest management and biotechnology products, which
looked to create better yield management for its end customer base of farmers growing
crops for food consumption and livestock grain feed.
With the need to plan seed production a full year in advance of the growing season, this
agribusiness manufacturer looked to Steelwedge to help it implement S&OP technology that
would enable it to understand what demand would look like in 12 and 24 months. In
addition, they required in-depth supply planning for active ingredients. By implementing the
Steelwedge integrated S&OP platform to replace dozens of spreadsheets and a legacy
system that didn’t let it plan with the detail or timeliness necessary, the agribusiness leader
can now:
Steelwedge maintains the customer’s S&OP process in the cloud to ensure scalability, and
offers specialized integration tools that allow rapid integration with its ERP and other
systems, enabling the agribusiness company to have a tighter focus on increasing
profitability and service levels.
INTEGRATED BUSINESS PLANNING FOR AGRIBUSINESS DATA SHEET
For the Executive Team:
Consolidate supply, demand and finance views into one comprehensive model
Enable more detailed planning assumptions via relationship attributes
(e.g., customer-specific pricing, source-specific costing)
Leverage mobile reporting, which provides information at the finger tips that is highly
synchronized with the planning data (planning analytics)