What's the backstory?

• Before Predictive SCS, Alex Maibaum was the Director of Operations melin, where high growth strained his team's inventory modeling and cash flow management capabilities.

• After seeing similar issues at multiple brands, Alex left melin to create Predictive SCS.

• With melin as a first customer, he devoped a web app that could eliminate 20-30 hours/week of manual work on inventory management, while keeping cashflow steady.

• They're now working with many other brands using their unique software + service deployment model.

Who do they work with?

• Predictive SCS works mostly with small to midsized brands ($5M - $500M)

• They specialize in companies with high numbers of size variants (like apparel and footwear), and who have multi-month planning cycles (unlike e.g. automotive)

What problems do they solve?

• Brands turn to Predictive SCS when they are struggling with inventory planning and forecasting.

• They help brands avoid mismatched inventory (i.e. being overstocked in some SKUs and stocked out in others).

How does it work?

• Predictive SCS is a combination of software and services.

• The core deliverable is 24-month forecasting at the SKU level (style/color/size) with a predictive algorithm that recommends purchasing based on user-defined thresholds.

• The system allows real-time, dynamic adjustments to model out future inventory positions (i.e. “what-ifs”) that let teams see the impact of changes and make course-corrections.

• Consulting services from experienced supply chain managers come bundled with the software and can help implement and optimize the software.

What makes it different?

• Focus on SKU-level management versus traditional top-down analysis

• More granular detail than competing solutions with the ability to model in real time

• Designed specifically for businesses that aren’t ready to invest in large-scale solutions

• Priced below the cost of hiring a full time supply chain manager

• Bundled software and consulting services approach

Fun facts

• Alex leveraged this platform to triple inventory turns for melin, improving cash flows to the business by over 50%.

• Alex is a real “get on the plane and fix it” type. E.g. he once flew from San Diego to Atlanta on a red-eye to locate “hidden” product due to incorrect tagging at a vendor warehouse, then flew back the same day after correcting the error.

• In another life, Alex played semi-pro rugby!

Want to learn more or get in touch? Check out their page on the StartOps Directory.