Organisations in Australia and New Zealand are reworking supply chain strategy, moving away from lean models built around cost minimisation and towards systems designed to withstand disruption, according to a new IDC InfoBrief sponsored by Blue Yonder.
The study, titled “Integrated execution: From sight to orchestration”, suggests the region is entering a new phase in which visibility alone is no longer enough. Instead, IDC says supply chains are increasingly expect...
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ed to combine data, partners and execution systems so businesses can respond more quickly when conditions change.
That shift appears to be driven by a hard reassessment of risk. IDC found that 43% of surveyed organisations in Australia and New Zealand said cost efficiency had historically been prioritised over resilience, leaving networks exposed to shocks. Nearly half, or 48%, now identify greater agility as the most important way to reduce supply chain risk, while 45% say tighter integration between systems and partners is essential for faster responses.
Pressures on suppliers and transport are reinforcing that change. The research shows 51% of surveyed ANZ organisations are dealing with rising supplier and freight costs, while 43% are worried about protectionism and tariffs undermining supply chain stability.
Stephanie Krishnan, associate vice-president at IDC Asia-Pacific and the report’s author, said the region has largely solved the visibility problem, but not the harder task of turning insight into action. Speaking to the study, she said the real advantage now lies in coordinating decisions across multiple partners and systems in real time.
The research also points to a growing appetite for artificial intelligence. According to IDC, 32% of supply chain leaders across Asia-Pacific say AI and machine learning are the most important capability gap they need to close in order to improve resilience. The report argues that agentic AI, which can coordinate decisions and initiate actions across supply chain networks, is likely to become central to operations over the next few years.
Blue Yonder has separately expanded its own agentic AI tools across planning and execution software, adding more role-specific mobile applications and deeper Microsoft Teams integration for teams in retail, manufacturing, transport, warehousing and customer service. The company says the update is intended to improve efficiency and coordination, though the broader trend is clear regardless of vendor: supply chains are being redesigned to act, not simply observe.
IDC says the transformation will depend on building a unified operational backbone that connects data, collaboration and execution. Ms Krishnan said the organisations that succeed will be those able to convert information into coordinated action across their entire supply ecosystem.
Source: Noah Wire Services
