A team from Blue Yonder attended the Manifest 2025 conference in Las Vegas last week, joining more than 7,200 attendees from the field of logistics. Presented by Blue Yonder customer DHL, Manifest brings together Fortune 500 global supply chain executives, logistics service providers (LSPs), innovators and investors. More than 400 speakers, including Blue Yonder customers and partners, discussed leading-edge innovations and technologies that are transforming the end-to-end supply chain.
The event was especially relevant for LSPs, who need to stay at the forefront of logistics digitalization to thrive in today’s fast-changing, increasingly competitive industry landscape. In our work with over 175 LSPs, Blue Yonder has seen firsthand the significant advantage that can be achieved by embracing technology innovation.
Manifest 2025 reinforced this value proposition, highlighting how artificial intelligence (AI) and other capabilities can help logistics teams navigate new tariffs, growing supply chain complexity and other challenges. In his keynote address, Patrick Kelleher, CEO of DHL Supply Chain North America, said, “We know the world around us is changing. There are so many things that need to be taken into account as we plan for success.”
In presentation after presentation, speakers emphasized the need for logistics teams to leverage the power of technology to become opportunistic and agile — instead of reactive — in light of these constant changes.
For LSPs — especially full-service fourth-party logistics providers (4PLs) — the stakes are high, and the challenges are incredibly complex. LSPs are not just managing one supply chain; they’re managing day-to-day logistics operations for multiple customers. That means events like new tariffs or extreme weather are exponentially more difficult to manage.
Clearly advanced technology, including AI and machine learning (ML), represents the only way to ensure a smart, profitable, real-time response to changing conditions. Manual analysis, spreadsheets and human intelligence are insufficient to manage a single supply chain, let alone many, in today’s volatile world.
Three key benefits of advanced technology for LSPs
At Blue Yonder, we see three key benefits that digitalization enables for the world’s LSPs. The great news is that, even for LSPs that may have fallen behind in technology adoption, cloud delivery models, composable journeys that include microservices, and other innovations make it easy to get up to speed. Imagine the difference advanced technology can make by positioning LSPs to accomplish the following:
1. Anticipate and mitigate disruptions
As we heard over and over at Manifest 2025, the days of supply chain predictability are over. Almost every day, there are new updates on tariffs, geopolitical conflicts and multinational trade alliances. And let’s not forget inflation, labor shortages and extreme weather.
The only way to manage these changes profitably is to become aware of them at the earliest opportunity, by using software to ingest and analyze real-time data from across the supply chain — as well as external sources like social media, news and weather. Once AI agents have sensed a disruption, powerful decision engines can conduct deep analysis, run what-if scenarios, and arrive at an intelligent, profitable course correction in mere minutes.
If the transportation management system (TMS), warehouse management system (WMS), order management system (OMS) and other digital solutions are hosted on a shared platform — such as Blue Yonder Platform — and connected in real time, then the response can be executed equally quickly. Instead of working in a siloed manner, applying different data and working toward narrow functional goals, all systems can be aligned to pivot immediately and collaboratively to disruptions — no matter where in the supply chain they occur.
For LSPs, that means they can enlist AI and other advanced technology to pivot every customer supply chain, instantly, in a way that makes sense for each specific customer. LSPs can “set it and forget it” as they establish cost and service objectives, constraints, decision rules and other guardrails on a customer-by-customer basis — then trust the software to do what’s best when anything goes wrong. That’s the power of modern AI.
2. Make AI- and event-driven decisions
Say the word “warehouse automation” and most people will envision order-picking robots and conveyor belts. But even more powerful is AI-enabled decision automation — not just in the warehouse, but across the supply chain.
Of course, decisions made in response to big changes, like an impending storm, get a lot of attention. But consider the hundreds or thousands of smaller decisions made across the supply chain every day. What if a sudden high-priority customer order comes in — and inventory is scarce? What if a driver misses a shift, endangering a critical delivery?
Instead of relying on intuition or one employee’s judgment, LSPs can leverage AI, data science and analytics to make these decisions on the spot, autonomously — again, based on predefined rules and guardrails. In Blue Yonder customer warehouses and fleets, these small operational hiccups are resolved invisibly, behind the scenes, every minute of every day. Employees can focus on larger issues and intervene only as needed.
Not only is lag time between decision and execution minimized, but LSPs can also rest assured that all decisions are optimal, because they’re driven by AI and real-time data.
3. Make profitable cost and service tradeoffs
When a critical customer relationship is at stake, it’s easy to make on-the-fly decisions aimed at protecting that relationship — like expediting a shipment or sourcing inventory from thousands of miles away. But those spur-of-the-moment decisions can steadily erode profits — and may negatively impact other important relationships.
Digitalization can help by revealing every course of action, including some that may not be readily apparent to humans. For example, AI and ML can rebalance inventory, optimize routes and loads, and take other actions to solve problems. If capacity or inventory can’t be found in the current network, LSPs can apply AI to extend that network, in seconds, to consider new sources. As Blue Yonder customers, leading LSPs can collaborate in a multienterprise manner with One Network’s 150,000 trading partners to orchestrate decisions and identify new ways to fill any service gaps, profitably.
Envision a more successful future, fueled by technology
Probably the clearest lesson from Manifest 2025 is that logistics teams need to embrace advanced technology now, or risk getting left behind. The keynotes and sessions we attended were inspiring and exciting. Clearly the potential of digitalization in the logistics industry is enormous.
But we understand that, for some LSPs, the race to digitalization and adopt AI can seem intimidating or overwhelming. When LSP team members are sitting in the audience listening to speakers talk about AI agents, ML algorithms, self-learning decision engines and other next-generation topics, it’s easy to think, “Can we ever get caught up?”
By working with Blue Yonder, you can quickly get up to speed. AI is quickly becoming a boardroom topic for LSPs and their clients. We’ve helped over 175 LSPs apply advanced technology to solve a wide range of challenges and achieve great return of investment, balancing growth with high service levels and stringent cost controls. Our wide range of capabilities for AI-driven decisioning and execution enables Blue Yonder to deliver a tailored solution for the needs of every LSP.
Don’t take my word for it. Reach out to Blue Yonder today, and start manifesting your own unique brand of supply chain success.
