o9 Solutions Launches ML, AI-Powered Integration with Google Cloud

Artificial intelligence software platform provider o9 Solutions has launched Vertex AI Forecast integration with Google Cloud as part of their ongoing partnership.

The new machine learning-powered solution is designed to help global retail and consumer goods companies create highly accurate demand forecasts that drive greater supply chain efficiencies and lead to increased market share and profits.

Introduced at Google Cloud Next ‘21, Vertex AI Forecast leverages machine learning models and vast data sets to understand the relationship between product demand and demand drivers such as promotions, pricing, competitive actions and external data such as weather, social sentiment, or Google Search trends. It then translates these signals into more accurate demand forecasts, allowing supply chain teams to make better planning decisions that minimize excess stock, avoid lost sales and reduce administrative and logistics costs.

Shifting trends and consumer buying behaviors are pushing brands to rethink the way they do demand planning. Yet, many global retail companies and consumer brands continue to rely on historical sales information and manual adjustments rather than data-based science to forecast future demand, according to o9 Solutions’ CEO Chakri Gottemukkala. Vertex AI Forecast’s machine learning models are expected to integrate with supply chain workflows and connect diverse demand signals, so companies can ultimately make better planning decisions.

Vertex AI Forecast integrates with o9’s AI-powered planning and decision-making platform through the company’s open architecture framework and leverages Google Cloud’s proprietary machine learning algorithms for demand forecasting. Vertex AI Forecast is the first of several solutions that o9 is jointly partnering on with Google Cloud as an application partner of Google Cloud’s recently launched digital Supply Chain Twin.