Executive Summary

Key Points

This report is part of the Coresight Matrix series, a product that helps Coresight Research clients better understand what is happening in key segments and with key players in retail technology.

• This report examines the supply-chain analytics software segment and uses our Coresight Matrix to evaluate leaders and emerging players in terms of innovation effort and market power.
• Supply-chain analytics software came from the need for enterprises to manage and derive insights from a large amount of data to drive growth, improve profitability, gain market share and make better business decisions.
• Market drivers include contracting product life cycles, limited visibility into the supply chain and the need to predict customer demand.
• Supply-chain analytics software can cut inventory costs and get products to market faster.
• This software category functions in three key areas: analytics (which includes demand forecasting, purchasing and inventory optimization); operations (including warehouse, employee, distribution-center and transportation management); and, reporting (including financial analysis, sales and operations analytics and results visualization and reporting).
• Software tools such as artificial intelligence, including machine learning, can automate and improve forecasting and determine optimal inventory configurations.
• Players within the segment include large enterprises such as IBM, SAP and Oracle, in addition to midsize leaders such as SAS and Infor, as well as emerging innovators such as ClearMetal, Contguard, Elementum and Haven.