Abhay Chougule

- Inventory Head: Leading a 3-member dynamic team which manages complete inventory and Instock functionalities of VRP

- Collaborating with Finance to plan & maintain healthy working capital & cashflow

▪ Ensure the Stock availability of Products across Watches and Jewellery Portfolio of the company constituting business volume of ~20-22mn
▪ Planning and execution for Seasonal Portfolio of Watches and Jewellery through Non-Linear tracking for SOH and Demand Curve adjustments.
▪ Delivered 15% Reduction in inventory holding for Watches through improvement in lead time variability, forecast accuracy and increased inventory turns.
Improved regional inventory for watches by 1,200 bps within 6 months of FY’24 by minimizing vendor lead time (VLT) and optimizing the inbounds within the operational capabilities of the vendors.
▪ Consistently maintained unhealthy inventory for watches below 3% through systematic interventions for controlled buying and close coordination with the business team on the sell-through planning. ▪ Worked as an SME for inventory automation and developed a review mechanism with the inventory team to ensure over 95% inventory and buying automation.

• Managing end-to-end Supply Chain and complex modeling of 2 Categories Amazon Private Brand for Luggage and Kitchen & Sports brands of Evenflow
• Devising strategies to ensure effective inventory management, supplier relationships, operational and supply-chain excellence
• Championing automation initiatives, taking data driven decisions, leading continuous process improvements, driving system and process automation with key internal teams, and maintaining a deep knowledge of the product line and its customers
• Pioneering plans to improve the customer experience and making decisions with internal and external stakeholders
• Negotiating operational changes with supplier in partnership with vendor manager to drive supply chain improvements; working with them on strategies to reduce cost, lead time, and waste across the end-to-end supply chain
• Analyzing financial metrics to improve efficiency of our inventory position across seller like Retail EZ, Cocblu, RK world & Etrade
• Ensuring knowledge management, development of self and others, and recruiting
• Achieving automation in Inventory Replenish Process, Inventory Health Management, OIH (Optimum Inventory Health Planning)

• Managed the availability of over 10,000 SKUs for a monthly business of INR 10 crore, optimizing service levels and working capital.
• Collaborated with cross-functional teams to develop and execute business plans, resulting in successful category and brand-specific growth.
• Optimized inventory level, increasing customer service level by 10%, while reducing working capital by $100K.

• Streamlined inventory management process resulting in a 10% reduction in working capital, and improved customer service levels by 25%.
• Responsibilities :
• Responsible for leading inventory strategy, monthly open-to-buy planning, pre-season planning, and other key functions.
• Increased the category's monthly sales by 10% through accurate inventory planning and effective forecasting.

• Led a team of 8 to deliver on category growth and profitability plans resulting in 15% increase in revenue and 10% improvement in margin.
• Led in-stock team of 4 to ensure optimal working capital deployment of INR 20 BN annual business & 1 MM+ SKUs’ availability
• Own the OTB (Open to buy) process monthly, which decides the buy & inbound plan for 10k+ Brand-sub cat-stock types balancing sell-through and inventory health & profile
• Responsible for buying entire H&L stock of 25-30 Cr monthly and managing inventory of 85 CR and ensuring replenishment on weekly basis
• Good team player and ability to manage large teams
• Personal drive and positive work ethic to deliver results within tight deadlines and in demanding situations
• Flexibility to adapt to a variety of engagement types, working hours and work environments, and locations Good communication and negotiation skills
• Clear understands of following areas with hands-on work experiences on Forecasting, Demand Planning, Capacity Planning
• Inventory management, Supply Planning, Logistics, Procurement
• Inspiring leader who can build point of view

• Responsibilities :
• Working strategically with plants and service operational teams to optimize stock, improve turns and reduce aged inventories.
• Partner with Material leaders and plants to establish operating mechanisms and develop actions to reduce aged inventory which will improve working capital and reduce obsolescence
• Root cause reasons why inventory is aging and develop action plans to prevent in the future
• Engage with service and plants to improve turns, match aged systems with backlog, and reallocate inventory to align with demand
• Develop domain expertise in inventory management leveraging oracle, operational dashboards and other reporting tools.
• Drive continuous improvement and implement best practices across global materials team
• Identification of Best Practices across Sites and deployment across all Regions