In March 2011, Leonardo Bonanni was preparing to defend his Ph.D. thesis about Sourcemap, software that lets consumers map every connection of a product supply chain on a digital map, when tragedy struck in Japan. Although the deadly earthquake and tsunami occurred half a world away, the events had an unexpected affect on Bonanni and Sourcemap.

In the aftermath, automobile, electronic, chemical, and retail sectors worldwide, which relied on Japanese manufacturers for parts and materials, suffered massive shortages. Few affected companies knew enough about the complex Japanese supply chain to respond to such an immense disruption.

“Companies hadn’t been keeping good mapping records of where their suppliers were, or where their suppliers’ suppliers were, so they asked us to deploy [Sourcemap] inside their supply chains,” says Bonanni. “All of a sudden these maps—the first to show products all the way from raw materials to consumers, every step of the way—became a critical tool for manufacturing companies.”

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