What is Supply Chain traceability?
Supply Chain Traceability is the capability to document and verify the history, location, and application of products and materials as they move through the supply chain, creating an immutable record of custody from raw material origin to the end consumer.
While Visibility answers the question "Where is my shipment right now?", Traceability answers the deeper questions: "Where did this come from?", "Who touched it?", and "Is it authentic?" It goes beyond logistics status to provide a granular "digital pedigree" for every item, ensuring that a pharmaceutical vial, a head of lettuce, or an EV battery is safe, genuine, and ethically sourced.
Why It Matters: From "Nice-to-Have" to Regulatory Mandate
Traceability has shifted from a brand differentiator to a rigid legal requirement. Governments worldwide are enforcing strict transparency laws to ensure public safety and sustainability:
- Life Sciences: The DSCSA (Drug Supply Chain Security Act) in the U.S. requires unit-level serialization to prevent counterfeits.
- Grocery: FSMA 204 (Food Safety Modernization Act) mandates strict record-keeping for high-risk foods to accelerate recall response times.
- Automotive: The EU Battery Regulation requires a "Battery Passport" to prove the ethical origin of minerals like cobalt and lithium.
Without robust traceability, global companies risk regulatory fines, border seizures, and catastrophic reputational damage.
How It Works: The Chain of Custody
Traceability relies on creating a continuous, interoperable "digital thread" that links physical goods to digital data:
- Serialization (The Identity): Every item or batch is assigned a unique identifier (e.g., SGTIN, RFID tag, or QR code) at the point of manufacture.
- Event Capture (The Journey): As the item moves from factory to warehouse to store, every scan captures a "Critical Tracking Event" (CTE)—recording who received it, when, and where.
- Data Exchange (The Network): This data is shared across the multi-enterprise network using standard formats (like EPCIS), ensuring that the retailer can verify the data generated by the raw material supplier.
Key Benefits
- Targeted Recalls: Instead of recalling all lettuce from shelves nationwide, a grocer can use traceability data to surgically recall only the specific batches from the contaminated farm, saving millions in waste and brand equity.
- Anti-Counterfeiting: In Luxury Goods and Pharma, it validates authenticity at the point of sale, ensuring customers don't receive dangerous or fake products.
- Sustainability Claims: It validates ESG claims by proving that materials were not sourced from conflict zones or regions using forced labor (e.g., UFLPA compliance).
- Operational Efficiency: Automated scanning reduces manual errors in receiving and shipping, ensuring inventory accuracy is near-perfect.
The Blue Yonder Difference
Blue Yonder differentiates its traceability offering through its Chain of Custody solution. Unlike standalone compliance tools that act as passive "databases," Blue Yonder integrates traceability directly into Supply Chain Planning and Execution.
This means that if a batch of raw materials is flagged for a quality issue, the system doesn't just record it; it can effectively "lock" that inventory across the network, preventing it from being allocated to production or shipped to customers. It turns compliance data into active operational control.