The new landscape of tariffs and import restrictions has companies working quickly to optimize their supply chains in order to avoid costly duties and disruptions. Chinese suppliers are increasingly hesitant to partner with U.S. companies for fear of tariff and market volatility. U.S. companies, meanwhile, are moving to engineer their tariff exposure to avoid the costliest value chain scenarios. These U.S. companies have to not only identify the magnitude of their exposure but, critically, identify those alternative suppliers that they can turn to in order to minimize that exposure.
Sayari Graph can help companies respond to today’s uncertainty by identifying alternative suppliers that present less risk or burden when compared to those suppliers located in countries with significant tariffs or other restrictions. Alternative suppliers with open capacity present a key consideration for companies seeking to navigate the rapidly-changing nature of today’s tariff and supply landscape.
Follow along with this example in Graph to learn how to find alternative supplies:
Let’s say you work for a U.S. clothing and retail company that imports polyester materials from a China-based supplier, Xiamen Xinlihuang Co. Ltd., which specializes in garment fabrics. Even though Xiamen Xinlihuang is not flagged in Sayari Graph for other import-control related risks, it presents your company with tariff-related risk based on its location in China.
This scenario planning is important if you determine that the tariff exposure is too burdensome to continue business with Xiamen Xinlihuang. Additionally, Xiamen Xinlihuang could decide to offload U.S. buyers due to its own concerns over canceled orders by American buyers and general market instability.
To the right of the search bar, you can use Sayari Graph’s Advanced Search features to identify other suppliers that operate in the same industry as Xiamen Xinlihuang, sell and export the same materials, and are located in a more tariff-friendly jurisdiction.
Advanced Search allows users to search for suppliers based on these and other criteria. Sayari’s 7+ billion records include entities from the corporate registries of over 250 jurisdictions. These registries often require that companies disclose their nature of business. By combining all of these data sources, Graph allows users to search worldwide for suppliers that match their business needs.
Once you’ve opened Advanced Search, you can begin to filter for suppliers that fit your company’s business needs. In this example, if your company wants to avoid suppliers in China subject to tariffs, you can change the drop down next to “Country” to “Is not” and in the blank space next to that type and select “China.” This will exclude entities with significant operations in China from this search.
In the third row, change the “Entity Type” dropdown to “Business purpose.” In the blank to the right you can write key business descriptors like “textile” and “wholesale” to find suppliers of interest. From there, hit Search to see a list of potential suppliers that you can then vet as alternatives to Xiamen Xinlihuang Co. Ltd.
Let’s say you wanted to find an alternative supplier of polyester specifically. In this case, business purpose disclosures may not be enough. Sayari Graph has import and export records from over 70 jurisdictions worldwide, including major trading hubs in South and Southeast Asia. These records include bill of lading information which captures descriptions of the products contained in shipments sent and received by consignors and consignees.
Using this information, you can conduct an even more precise advanced search to identify those companies that sell and export polyester. Open Advanced Search again but filter to “Trade” rather than “Entities” at the top.
Under Shipment Attributes, set the Country of Departure to “Is not China” and the Product Description to “Is polyester.” Under Supplier Attributes, set the Supplier Country to “Is not China” and indicate which risk factors are of concern to you under the Supplier Risk category. In this case, we’ve filtered for “Is not” flagged for a risk of “Forced Labor,” “Regulatory Action,” “Political Exposure,” “Sanctions,” “Export Controls,” “Possibly Same as Network Risk,” and “Adverse Media.” This ensures that when you click Search you will see a list of suppliers that have no indication of these specific risks.