Paul Bohr

At the Gartner Supply Chain Planning Summit in Denver, Scott Luton sat down with Nari Viswanathan, a veteran innovator in the planning and procurement technology space and a key leader at Coupa. The two reconnected after several recent collaborations—including webinars, industry sessions, and conversations in Dallas—and discussed the new realities of supply chain planning and how organizations are embracing technology like never before.   Coupa and Autonomous Spend Management For those less familiar with Coupa, Viswanathan explained the company as the global leader in autonomous spend management—a framework that brings together direct and indirect spending to help organizations manage total spend more intelligently. Direct spend, of course, is where supply chain operations come into focus, making planning, design, and cost optimization central to the value Coupa delivers. Viswanathan leads Coupa’s global supply chain strategy, shaping how the company positions and scales its solutions across the market. After years spent in supply chain planning technology, he now sits at the intersection of procurement, supply chain, and advanced analytics—an area he believes has never been more exciting or more critical.   Old Problems, New Pressures—and a Greater Willingness to Innovate When asked about the biggest challenges facing planners today, Viswanathan emphasized a…

Another great week here at Supply Chain Now! Have you listened to all the episodes? If not, no worries! Check them all out here: We added a special Saturday episode on May 9th and featured another speaker from the 2020 AIAG CR Summit, Eric Kane with Bloomberg, and his insights from the conference.   On Monday, we continued our Supply Chain Super Trends series with Sarah Barnes-Humphrey with Let’s Talk Supply Chain. Supply Chain Super Trend #3 focused on a holistic approach to supply chain TALENT.     Mike Griswold with Gartner joined us for another excellent livestream last week, and we published it as a podcast episode on Tuesday. He shared his latest observations on how COVID-19 is impacting global supply chains. A MUST-listen!     We continued our interviews with the speakers from the AIAG CR Summit on Wednesday, with great insights from Dr. Assheton Carter with TDI Sustainability.     Thursday we published our popular Supply Chain Buzz, with Scott and Greg sharing and discussing the latest news and events in Supply Chain and beyond.     And on Friday, we wrapped up the interviews with the extrordinary speakers from the AIAG CR Summit, with Brian Rich…