Two sets of plants, CFAs and vendors; duplicate lanes; fragmented planning processes. On paper, the acquisition looked great. On the ground, the supply chain was carrying duplicate cost and complexity.

EY was brought in to help the combined entity turn supply chain into the main synergy lever instead of a drag. The program focused on three big blocks:

Procurement synergies & vendor optimisation

• Deep dives into packaging and raw material cost sheets to identify saving levers

• Shifting to index-linked buying for key materials to de-risk volatility

• Consolidating vendor bases where both entities were buying similar SKUs from different suppliers

• Running market assessments and alternate vendor discovery for high-impact categories

Network & logistics optimisation

• End-to-end network modelling using sales gravity, cost-to-serve and service level constraints

• Center-of-gravity analysis for CFAs and hubs to decide which locations to keep, consolidate or exit

• Identifying opportunities to consolidate lanes and warehouses, and pilot 3PL-led models in key regions

One S&OP, one truth

• The two organisations had different planning philosophies, calendars and governance

• EY helped define a common S&OP design covering demand planning, replenishment and decision forums

• Forecasting processes were tightened, replenishment rules reworked, and a more formal decision-making cadence was put in place so commercial, supply and finance were looking at the same reality

Impact

• 7–10% procurement synergy identified across key packaging categories

• 12–15% potential reduction in logistics spends from network and lane optimisation

• Around 20% inventory reduction potential from better planning and integrated S&OP

Beyond the numbers, the big win was cultural: treating supply chain not as a back-end clean-up job after M&A, but as the primary engine to unlock value from the deal.

[Read More at EY](https://www.ey.com/en_in/insights/supply-chain/how-ey-optimized-the-supply-chain-of-a-leading-indian-mnc?utm_source=chatgp[link removed]m)