TPC and Catalyst AI partner to bring AI to retail supply chain

As the retail sector looks to find efficiency savings and improve results in a challenging period, the importance of an effective supply chain has been significantly enhanced. In order to help businesses improve on costs and customer service provision, specialist consultancies Thought Provoking Consulting and Catalyst AI have launched a new partnership focused on clients in the retail industry.

In line with most other industries, the supply chain sector is in the grip of a sustained period of change, as industry leaders wrestle with the concept of digital transformation in order to both streamline and secure their operational processes. This is completely pertinent for the traditional retail sector, which has suffered a borderline disastrous 2018, as increased import costs and geo-political friction has left many companies scrambling to find savings to balance the books.

With the opportunities to provide cheap, agile solutions and improve customer service via rapid deliveries and improved stock systems, AI can transform this situation, however. This was recently exemplified by Charles Tyrwhitt’s selection of retail consultancy Thought Provoking Consulting (TPC) to support with the design and implementation of a new sales and stock-planning software. The firm will help draft a roadmap for the changes, before assisting the clothing retailer with the change management process.

Now, as the firm looks to help more clients in the sector improve their supply chains and find savings and improvements to operations, TPC has announced a partnership with AI consulting firm Catalyst AI. The partnership will enable TPC to enhance and extend its proprietary SMART tools through the adoption of a variety of relevant AI and Automation capabilities developed in partnership with Catalyst AI. Meanwhile, as a consultancy developing practical applications for AI in the business world, Catalyst AI will help TPC equip retailers with state of the art capabilities designed to make better and faster business decisions.

Subir Gupta, TPC Co-Founder and Managing Principal said, “We are excited to be partnering with Catalyst AI to bring the next generation of AI-enabled algorithmic retailing capabilities to market. Our data science enabled pricing, promotion and markdown management solutions have been delivering substantial benefits to retailers for many years… We aim to transform the decision making effectiveness of Merchandising and Supply Chain functions whilst simultaneously eliminating low value administrative tasks, enabling teams to focus more time on creative activities which deliver demonstrable bottom line results.”

Raymond Siems, Catalyst AI Co-Founder and CEO added, “The most effective partnerships bring together expertise across different domains and disciplines… Retail is ripe for innovation led by AI. The sector possesses a wealth of data, thanks to increasingly mature digitalisation efforts, and a wide range of interpretable external signals which can be intelligently harnessed to inform decision making processes that are difficult for firms to manage at scale.”