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Beside the Order to Cash scenario, Lead, Opportunity & Pipeline Management is definitely a key scenario for the Chemical Industry. As the spreading global recession is expected to last well into entire 2009, with a modest recovery in 2010, cash flow generation is essential to survive and chemical producers have to exploit each opportunity and focus on pipeline management and profitability. High level of service should be exclusively delivered to the most profitable customers. A strong collaboration between Sales and Product Management is a prerequisite for a balanced demand chain and a seamless information flow from customer inquiries via Sales Representatives, Sales Management, Product Management, towards Operations, Supply Chain Planning & Execution, and Product Development.

Key processes in this scenario are Sales & Product Management Planning and Collaborative Pipeline Management.

Sales and Product Management Planning as the initial step in S&OP, it starts at a strategic level and seeks alignment between supply and demand planning.  This alignment is an iterative process (top-down/bottom-up) including the stakeholders mentioned above. Collaborative Pipeline Management is an interactive application to align planning and execution in order to react on customer inquiries, unforeseen events and to plan quotes and manage pipeline activities like Lead and Account Management, Price & Margin Management, Opportunity and Quote Management and pipeline improving activities.