Case Study: KYOWA achieves near-zero stock-outs and automated inventory management with Yellowfin Signals (Yellowfin)

Using Yellowfin Signals to automate inventory management and reduce opportunity loss to almost zero

KYOWA, a Tokyo-based cosmetics and health food manufacturer that sells largely by mail order, faced frequent out-of-stock (OOS) events driven by a large SKU catalogue, varied lead times (30–90 days) and inventory tracking via spreadsheets that relied on specific people. Having used Yellowfin since 2017 for analytics, KYOWA implemented Yellowfin’s automated monitoring product, Yellowfin Signals, in early 2020 to strengthen decision-making and reduce opportunity loss caused by stock-outs.

Yellowfin linked accounting data into a consolidated inventory report, then deployed Yellowfin Signals to automatically detect item-specific trends (using moving averages and confidence intervals) and notify users of risks they would otherwise miss; Yellowfin Story was used to embed Signals into daily workflows. The result: OOS events dropped to almost zero (no stockouts up to June), reduced man-hours on inventory management, and KYOWA expects opportunity loss to be “as close to zero as possible” this fiscal year, while planning to expand Yellowfin Signals to analyze repeat-customer purchasing trends.

KYOWA

Hirofumi Mukaida

Data Management Team, Team Leader, Information Strategy Group, Group Leader