Earlier this year I had the opportunity to hear former president Vincete Fox of Mexico talk about the the changing economics of Nearshoring. And sure enough, I was sitting next to an executive from a large high technology company that had recently shifted production from Asia back to Mexico. Roll forward four months and McKinsey today published a nice article Time to rethink offshoring?

Finally. After ten years of hype surrounding Supply Chain Visibility (SCV), I am seeing mainstream adoption. Sure, many 'earlier adoptor' companies took the plunge during the go-go days of 1999/2000, then the market flat-lined post-bubble. Nobody had investment dollars to spend on projects numbered 2, 3 and 4. The big enterprise app companies were doing a good job soaking up the cash and attention of most IT teams.

Roll forward eight years and the market is ramping up based on two key trends:

1. the shift to Direct Procurement models of global sourcing; and,
2. the increased accountability of importers with regulations such as the Importer Security Filing (ISF), affectionately known as Customs 10+2.

Fundamentally, the advance of low cost sourcing strategies is challenging the old forwarder/spreadsheet business process that many Importers have employed. Importers must extend business processes, collaborate with trading partners, and control the flow.