Guide
Table of Contents
Understanding Exposure Analysis: What It Is and How It Helps
What is Exposure Analysis
Exposure Analysis is a feature designed to help companies understand how their supply chain is impacted by connections to problematic entities, such as sanctioned companies. This analysis evaluates whether any of your direct suppliers (typically tier-1) have relationships with companies that pose compliance or reputational risks within your broader supply chain, as well as other details on these connections, such as:
What Problem does Exposure Analysis Solve?
Managing supply chain risk is complex, especially when dealing with multi-tiered networks. Often, companies do not have visibility beyond their direct suppliers, making it difficult to detect potential risks in lower-tier connections. Exposure Analysis address this challenge by:
- Identifying which suppliers in your network have links to problematic companies.
- Revealing which tiers or your supply chain these connections occur.
- Providing detailed insights into how these connections might affect your business.
How Can You Benefit from Exposure Analysis?
By using Exposure Analysis, you gain:
- Risk Visibility: You can see if your tier-1 suppliers are indirectly connected to high-risk entities, helping you proactively manage exposure.
- Informed Decision-Making: With detailed data about the connections, you can make more informed decisions regarding supplier relationships, ensuring compliance with legal and ethical standards.
- Supply Chain Optimization: The ability to visualise how risks flow through your supply chain enables better prioritisation of risk mitigation efforts
How to Use Exposure Analysis
Accessing Exposure Analysis
To begin, you can access Exposure Analysis via the Tier-N Explorer in the Prewave applications' top bar (feel free to reach out to sales if it's not within your subscription package currently).
Once in the Tier-N Explorer, choose between the Exposure Analysis and Network Analysis options. Select Exposure Analysis to proceed.
From here, you can either start a new analysis or view an existing one.
Setting Up a New Exposure Analysis
- Start a New Analysis: Click on the “+ Start a new Exposure Analysis” button.
- Define Parameters:
- Analysis Name & Date: Provide a name for the analysis and select a date. This will be stored as metadata for future reference.
- Base Collection: This is the group of companies whose risk exposure you want to examine, typically your tier-1 suppliers. You can choose any collection you are following in Prewave.
- Exposed Collection: This includes the group of high-risk or sanctioned companies you want to check for connections within your supply chain. You can also select any collection you are tracking in Prewave.
You can adjust the supply chain settings separately from the collections, allowing you to create various scenarios for the same analysis.An article about this can be found here.
Reviewing the Results
Once the user has successfully defined the parameters and clicked Create, the following screen will appear.
You will be presented with a detailed overview, which includes the following components:
Exposure Summary Table-
- Lists all base suppliers and the number of connections to companies in the exposed collection.
- Shows how many exposures exist on each tier of the supply chain.
- Allows you to sort suppliers based on the highest number of exposures at the closest tier levels (e.g., tier-1).
You can also preview a specific supplier’s exposure details by hovering over the row and selecting "Preview."
Exposure Visualisation (Sankey Graph)Once a base supplier is selected or the 'Graph' tab is clicked, a Sankey graph visualizing the exposure is displayed.
This graph highlights supply chains with identified exposures. Each column represents a tier of the supply chain, with suppliers as blocks. Base suppliers appear in the leftmost column, while exposed suppliers are highlighted in red.
The graph is sorted by the number of exposures. Base suppliers with the most exposures are listed at the top of the first column, and exposed suppliers with the most connections to base suppliers are listed at the top of each tier.
Clicking the lines between suppliers reveals detailed information, such as the products shipped between them.
The width of the lines represents the number of shipments between suppliers—thicker lines indicate more shipments.
Suppliers in the graph are clickable. Selecting a supplier highlights it along with all connected suppliers.
For example, clicking an exposed supplier will highlight all base suppliers that have this exposed supplier in their supply chain, as well as the paths connecting these suppliers.
Also, hovering the mouse over a supplier reveals some additional details.
In the popup it shows how many shipments in total the supplier has shipped, and in case of an exposed supplier, how many base suppliers have that exposed supplier in their supply chain.
Filters for Base and Exposed Collections
- You can search for specific suppliers within both the base and exposed collections, and adjust the tier range to focus on certain levels of the supply chain.
Downloadable report
After reviewing the analysis, you can download a detailed report by selecting the download option located in the top-right corner of the screen. This report captures both live and saved analyses for further reference or sharing within your organization.
Summary
Exposure Analysis is an essential tool for identifying and managing risk within complex supply chains. It helps companies maintain compliance by uncovering hidden connections to problematic entities, providing detailed insights and actionable data. By following the steps outlined above, users can efficiently use this feature to safeguard their supply chains and make informed, strategic decisions.