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May 28, 2021

This Week In Supply Chain Now: May 24th – 28th

What’s been happening at Supply Chain Now? This week, our program hosts welcomed many special guests this week to talk about startup growth, manufacturing, procurement, and, of course, supply chain! Check out the latest interviews, conversations, and podcast episodes right here! On Monday, we released 2 new episodes! In this episode of Dial P for Procurement, hosts Kelly Barner, Scott Luton, and Kim Winter welcome special guest Sam Achampong to talk about why it’s absolutely crucial for procurement to be aligned with your overall business strategy. On This Week in Business History, host Scott Luton delves into the story of Dr. Lillian Gilbreth, whom many refer to as “the Mother of Modern Management” and “America’s First Lady of Engineering”. On Tuesday, we released 2 new episodes! On this episode of Supply Chain Now, Lora Cecere, Founder of Supply Chain Insights, sat down with Scott Luton and Greg White to discuss COVID-19’s impact on software development, chip shortages, supply chain performance metrics, and more! On TECHquila Sunrise, host Greg White welcomed Jack Freeman of PeakSpan Capital to hear his path from startup to the investor seat, including what he’s learned, what he’s still learning and some new areas that he’s getting…
why urban mining is important for supply chains
March 25, 2026

The Geopolitics of Junk

written by Deborah Dull, on site at GreenBiz 2026   I spent today in a room full of people who think about waste for a living. And the word that kept coming up had nothing to do with recycling. It was sovereignty. Here is the situation. The United States imports 95% of its critical mineral supply. Lithium, cobalt, rare earth elements, the stuff inside every battery, every semiconductor, every electric motor. We do not make it, we do not mine much of it, and we do not control the supply chain that delivers it. That is not an energy policy problem. That is a national security problem. Now here is the part that should make you put down your coffee. A ton of smartphones contains dramatically more gold than a ton of mined ore. We are talking about concentrations that make urban mining look like a gold rush compared to digging in the ground. And yet the recovery rate for those materials, once a phone leaves its first owner, drops to around 13%. We are losing roughly 80% of the value sitting in devices right now, in drawers, in closets, in landfills. E-waste is also the fastest growing waste stream…