/www.eetimes.com, Jun. 13, 2025 –
In an era of unprecedented divergence and volatility, global supply chains find themselves at an inflection point, where lack of artificial intelligence (AI) strategy creates long-term risks.
While once reliable operating assumptions are no longer stable, the strategic importance of supply chain management has surged to the forefront of C-suite concerns.
A commanding 75% of Chief Executive Officers now believe that supply chain disruption is one of the most significant risks to their business.
Yet, despite artificial intelligence’s escalating impact, a stark and potentially perilous disconnect persists: just 23% of supply chain organizations have a formal, documented AI strategy in place.
This alarming statistic, revealed in a recent Gartner survey conducted between December 2024 and January 2025, suggests that many Chief Supply Chain Officers (CSCOs), operating under intense pressure to demonstrate an immediate return on investment (ROI), may be inadvertently jeopardizing AI’s profound long-term transformative potential within their operations.
“CSCOs feel pressure to achieve short-term ROI from their AI investments, but they must ensure these quick wins don’t create future constraints,” cautioned Benjamin Jury, senior principal of research in Gartner’s Supply Chain practice.
This prevailing project-by-project approach focused narrowly on short-term gains, risks creating what Gartner refers to as inefficient “franken systems”—complex, layered architectures that impede scalability, prolong the payback period for AI transformations, and ultimately yield only marginal long-term benefits with fragile technical infrastructure.