Multi-location Sourcing Overview

In this article

Mandatory and Optional Setups

Multi-location Sourcing Rules

Stay within the destination market

Minimize split fulfillment

Ship from the closest location

Use location priority

Multi-location Sourcing Explorer

The new Multi-location Sourcing functionality delivers a more flexible, rule-driven, and intelligent approach to Customer Order fulfillment. With configurable rules, distance calculations, market restrictions, and a dedicated testing tool, businesses can fine-tune their fulfillment logic to reduce costs, improve delivery performance, and align with operational priorities.

When the Multi-location Sourcing feature is activated, a Customer Order can be sourced from one or multiple locations. This is only applicable for Customer Orders that are to be shipped.

Mandatory and Optional Setups

To use the Multi-location Sourcing functionality in the Customer Order module, follow these steps:

1. [Mandatory] Turn on Multi-location Sourcing Active on the Customer Order Setup page.
2. [Optional] Configure the sourcing rules. Navigate to the Customer Order Sourcing Rules page from the Customer Order Setup page. First use action Set Default Rules to insert all available rules. Then you can activate or deactivate each rule and change their sequences. The rules with lower sequence number have higher priority and will be applied first. Use location priority is the default rule and also the tie-breaker. If no rule is activated on this list, the program will still apply the Use location priority rule to find the best sourcing combination.
3. [Optional] Configure the distance calculation.If you've activated the Ship from the closest location rule, you need to configure the Azure Map API Setup to calculate distance between the sourcing locations and the delivery addresses. First use action Insert Default API URLs to insert all default values. Then you need to acquire an API Key from the Azure Portal.If you are using Azure Maps API to calculate the distance, the program will save the API calls in the Azure Maps Log based on the Log Level you define on the Azure Maps API Setup page.On the Customer Order Setup page, you can define the Distance Calculation Method. You can choose between Calculate Straight Line Distance or Calculate Route.
4. [Optional] Configure the markets.If you've activated the Stay within the destination market rule, you can define the markets and map countries to markets. The program will only consider sourcing locations within the same market as the customer's address. You can navigate to these settings from the Customer Order Setup page, via action Sourcing Markets.

Multi-location Sourcing Rules

1. Stay within the destination market

   Qualified sourcing locations for a particular store are those set up as Sourcing Locations for this store and can ship orders. Based on the customer’s address, the pre-defined Markets and the Market/Country Mapping, the program will filter out sourcing locations that are not within the same market as the customer's address.

   For this to work correctly, make sure you have set up Azure Maps API Setup, Markets, and calculated the Latitude and Longitude for all locations. The Latitude and Longitude of the customer’s address will be calculated just-in-time. If the Latitude and Longitude of a location is missing, the program cannot calculate the distance between the customer’s address and sourcing locations.

2. Minimize split fulfillment

   Order: Item1, Item2

   Several locations have stock. And the program needs to decide which is the best sourcing combination.

   Example 1:

   Location	Item1	Item2
   A	x
   B		x
   C	x	x

   Possible combos:

   {A, B}
   {C}

   The program will choose the combo with the fewest shipments: {C}

   Example 2:

   Location	Item1	Item2
   A	x
   B		x
   C	x
   D		x

   Possible combos:

   {A, B}

   {A, D}

   {B, C}

   {C, D}

   All combos are equally good and have the same number of shipments.

   Here, two scenarios can happen:

   1. Minimize split fulfillment is the last rule to apply. The program will apply the Use Location Priority rule (tiebreaker) and select the combo having the highest priority.
   2. Minimize split fulfillment is not the last rule to apply. The program will pass the combos to the next rule. And that rule will decide which one is the best.

3. Ship from the closest location

   Order: Item1, Item2

   Several locations have stock with different distances to the customer's address. And the program needs to decide which is the best sourcing combination.

   Example 1:

   Location	Item1	Item2	Distance
   A	x		1
   B		x	2
   C	x	x	10

   Possible combos:

   {A, B} Distance 3
   {C} Distance 10

   The program will choose the combo with the shortest distance: {A, B}.

   Example 2:

   Location	Item1	Item2	Distance
   A	x		10
   B		x	2
   C	x	x	3

   Possible combos:

   {A, B} Distance 12
   {C} Distance 3

   The program will choose the combo with the shortest distance: {C}.

   Example 3:

   Location	Item1	Item2	Distance
   A	x		1
   B		x	2
   C	x	x	3

   Possible combos:

   {A, B} Distance 3
   {C} Distance 3

   All combos are equally good and have the same distances.

   Here, two scenarios can happen:

   1. Ship from the closest location is the last rule to apply. The program will apply the Use Location Priority rule (tiebreaker) and select the combo having the highest priority.
   2. Ship from the closest location is not the last rule to apply. The program will pass the combos to the next rule. And that rule will decide which one is the best.

4. Use location priority

   Order: Item1, Item2

   Several locations have stock with different priority points. Lower point means higher priority. And the program needs to decide which is the best sourcing combination.

   Example 1:

   Location	Item1	Item2	Priority
   A	x		1
   B		x	2
   C	x	x	10

   Possible combos:

   {A, B} Priority 3
   {C} Priority 10

   The program chooses the combo with the highest priority (the lowest point): {A, B}.

   Example 2:

   Location	Item1	Item2	Priority
   A	x		10
   B		x	2
   C	x	x	3

   Possible combos:

   {A, B} Priority 12
   {C} Priority 3

   The program chooses the combo with the highest priority (the lowest point): {C}.

   Example 3:

   Location	Item1	Item2	Priority
   A	x		1
   B		x	2
   C	x	x	3

   Possible combos:

   {A, B} Priority 3
   {C} Priority 3

   All combos are equally good and have the same priority points.

   Here, two scenarios can happen:

   1. Use Location Priority is the last rule to apply. It acts as the tiebreaker and the program selects one of the combos above since they are equally good in term of priority.
   2. Use Location Priority is not the last rule to apply.The program passes the combos to the next rule, which determines the best combo.

Multi-location Sourcing Explorer

The core of the Multi-location Sourcing feature is where the program find all possible and valid sourcing combinations based on the inventory availability and select the best combination based on the sourcing rules. We have created a page to expose this core functionality for testing and demo purposes. You can navigate to this page from the Customer Order Setup page, via action Multi-location Sourcing Explorer.

On this page, you can specify the following information:

• The no. of locations.
• The no. of items.
• Which rules are active.
• Where the items are available.
• The distance to the customer from each location.
• The priority of each location.

Then run action Find Sourcing Combinations and view the results under the tabs Valid Combinations and Final Combination.