Hot Topics

Why It’s on Everyone’s Radar

Climate risk is now a front-line issue, not just a future concern. With severe weather events increasing in frequency and intensity, companies are being forced to rethink how they build resilience into supply chain operations. This topic is heating up across the industry because it intersects risk, ESG, visibility, and long-term value creation—making it both a business necessity and a strategic differentiator.

A New Kind of Supply Chain Pressure

Climate disruptions are no longer a future threat—they’re a present and growing force reshaping global supply chains. Floods delay shipments. Wildfires shut down transportation corridors. Droughts reduce energy supply and slow production. These events aren’t isolated—they’re happening more often, with greater impact, and they’re
hitting supply chains at every level, especially in the lower tiers where visibility is weakest.

For many companies, these aren’t rare exceptions. They’re becoming routine risks that erode margins, delay customer deliveries, and weaken supplier performance. Traditional planning tools, built on historical averages, weren’t designed to manage this level of volatility.

Climate Risk Is Supply Chain Risk

According to McKinsey, up to 45% of one decade’s EBITDA can be at risk due to supply chain disruptions linked to climate events.

Yet, many organizations are still planning based on “normal” conditions. In today’s environment, that’s a risky assumption.

What Resilient Companies Are Doing Differently

Leading organizations are making resilience a core planning capability. That doesn’t mean eliminating risk—it means adapting faster and smarter when disruptions occur. Common traits among more resilient supply chains include:

• Supplier and geographic diversification to reduce exposure to regional disruptions
• Scenario modeling and digital twins that simulate climate-related events before they happen
• Tier 2 and Tier 3 visibility, not just Tier 1 oversight
• Integration between ESG goals and operational decisions to build sustainability and resilience in tandem

ESG and Resilience Are Converging

Sustainability and resilience are no longer separate strategies. Companies are increasingly making decisions that serve both. Low-emission transportation, energy- efficient production, and circular economy practices are helping reduce both environmental footprint and operational exposure.

This convergence is driving a new level of alignment between supply chain, sustainability, and risk functions.

The Planning Imperative

To stay ahead of climate-driven disruption, supply chains must evolve:

• Visibility is no longer optional — it’s foundational
• Scenario planning must expand to include environmental and infrastructure risks
• Integrated business planning tools need to connect climate realities with operational and financial decisions

This isn’t just about reacting better — it’s about planning smarter.

The Bottom Line

Climate risk is no longer a separate category — it’s embedded in the supply chain itself. Companies that invest in resilience now won’t just recover faster from disruption — they’ll gain long-term advantages in performance, trust, and adaptability.

In a world that’s changing faster than ever, building a supply chain that can withstand — and adapt to — climate volatility is no longer a competitive edge. It’s a necessity.

Why It’s on Everyone’s Radar

IBP is a hot topic because companies are realizing that traditional S&OP isn’t keeping up with today’s pace of change. Disconnected decisions across finance, supply chain, and commercial teams lead to misalignment and risk. IBP is emerging as the new standard for companies that want to operate faster, smarter, and with greater cross- functional alignment—especially in the face of constant disruption.

Evolving Your Planning Process for a Faster World

Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP) has served supply chain teams for decades. But today’s complexity and speed demand more. Integrated Business Planning (IBP) is the natural next step—expanding S&OP to link supply, demand, finance, product strategy, and long-range business goals in a unified planning approach.

IBP enables organizations to make coordinated decisions across time horizons. Instead of isolated plans by function, companies operate from a shared, integrated model that reflects what’s happening now—and what’s coming next.

Why the Shift from S&OP to IBP?

S&OP was built for monthly cycles. But in today’s world, monthly isn’t fast enough. Sudden demand shifts, material shortages, or global disruptions can happen in hours—not weeks.

IBP brings together key stakeholders and systems—operations, finance, sales, supply chain—to create real-time visibility and collaboration, allowing teams to model trade- offs and adjust quickly.

It’s not just about balancing supply and demand. It’s about aligning supply chain actions with revenue goals, margin targets, and corporate strategy.

What IBP Enables

A well-executed IBP process helps organizations:

• Align demand and supply with financial and strategic objectives
• Create a single version of the truth across planning and execution
• Run “what-if” scenarios to evaluate trade-offs and risks
• Connect monthly planning with daily execution for better agility

Who’s Adopting It?

While IBP was once associated with large enterprises, it’s gaining traction with mid-sized companies seeking scalable, cross-functional planning. Many are starting with core integration — like demand, supply, and finance — and layering in complexity as planning maturity improves.

Bottom Line

IBP represents a shift in how businesses plan — not just more data, but better alignment and faster action. As supply chains grow more complex, companies that evolve from S&OP to IBP will be better positioned to navigate uncertainty, drive performance, and support smarter growth.

Why It’s on Everyone’s Radar

Agentic AI is making headlines because it marks a major shift in how companies use technology to make real time, autonomous decisions. As supply chains become more digitized and complex, the move from decision support to decision execution is creating both opportunity and pressure. Organizations that understand and adopt Agentic AI early will have a significant edge in responsiveness, cost efficiency, and scalability.

The Shift from Decision Support to Autonomous Execution

AI has long played a supporting role in supply chain—improving forecasts, detecting anomalies, and recommending actions. But a new evolution is underway: Agentic AI, where AI systems don’t just support decision-making—they take action on their own. Agentic AI refers to autonomous systems that pursue goals, respond to real-time changes, and make operational decisions without constant human input. In supply chain
terms, that could mean rerouting shipments in response to disruptions, reallocating inventory based on updated demand, or adjusting production schedules automatically as constraints emerge.

This shift from assistance to autonomy is being driven by several key enablers:

• Connected data environments (via cloud, APIs, IoT)
• Advanced models like reinforcement learning and LLMs
• End-to-end platform integration, allowing actions across systems like ERP, TMS, and APS

Where Agentic AI Fits in Supply Chain

This isn’t about replacing planners — it’s about augmenting human capacity in high-velocity, high-variability decisions:

• Adjusting supply plans across regions based on shifting demand
• Rescheduling production when key materials are delayed
• Rerouting orders based on transportation or weather constraints

Agentic AI brings value where manual intervention is too slow — or simply not scalable.

Getting Started: Building Toward Autonomy

Most companies aren’t ready to hand over full control to AI, and they shouldn’t. Success starts with:

• Clean, well-governed data
• Clear boundaries and exception rules
• Realistic pilot use cases with measurable outcomes

Adoption should be incremental, with human oversight as confidence builds.

Bottom Line

Agentic AI is reshaping how supply chains operate — bringing speed, precision, and resilience to a world that no longer moves at a monthly planning pace. As companies look to modernize planning, Agentic AI is not the destination, but a capability to build toward — one that extends human judgement and accelerates action when it matters most.