TOR144: Innovation To Disrupt Supply Chains With Andrew Lamb Of Field Ready

Terms Of Reference Podcast

While we live in a world of unprecedented prosperity for many, we also live in a world that is experiencing unprecedented levels of humanitarian crisis. You know the examples: protracted violent conflicts, devastation caused by earthquakes or hurricanes, the specters of famine or disease outbreak... unfortunately the list goes on and on.

The good news is that we have a humanitarian community that does a fantastic job of responding to these crises with the resources available to them. In large part, supplies arrive, shelter is provided and people receive care until a time in which they can begin the transition back to normalcy.

Unfortunately, as with the creation of any system, developing the capacity to address these large scale crises has produced unintended consequences and externalities. One of these externalities is a logistics and supply chain ecosystem that is bureaucratic, expensive and rigid. On this, the 144th episode of the Terms Of Reference Podcast, I talk with Andrew Lamb of Field Ready about how their organization is disrupting logistics and supply chains currently associated with humanitarian aid by helping to solve problems at the source, in the communities affected by crisis.

Andrew is the Innovation Advisor for Field Ready. He is the former CEO of Engineers Without Borders – UK, he co-founded and serves as a Trustee of the Humanitarian Centre in Cambridge and he is a Trustee of RedR-UK. You're going to love this episode because it is packed with specific examples about how Field Ready is disrupting the delivery of humanitarian aid through design, process re-engineering, 3D printing and more.