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10 notes · Open access · Newest first

Short notes that live between the Points of View — observations from customer rooms, arguments worth posting on their own, the questions a leadership team is actually asking this quarter.

May 20, 2026

Most Supply Chains Go Blind Between Planning Cycles

By Thursday afternoon, the Monday plan is usually dead — and that gap is where the real work happens.

Ashutosh Bansal
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May 17, 2026
Long-form available

Optimization vs. Negotiation

Most S&OP meetings end with five disagreeing plans reconciled by whoever is loudest. Optimization lets the math reconcile and the room ratify.

Ashutosh Bansal
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May 7, 2026
Long-form available

From Plans to Policies: The Next Decade of Supply Chain Advantage

A decade of better predictions has not made supply chains more resilient. Optimize the policy, not the plan.

Ashutosh Bansal
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March 1, 2026

Why Semiconductor S&OP Is Underpricing Volatility — And What It’s Costing You Each Cycle

In an industry where a quarter can swing revenue by 30–40%, most semis still plan like volatility is an exception. The cost is tens of millions a cycle.

Ashutosh Bansal
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February 24, 2026

Taming Volatility at Scale

Variability isn't going away. Mispricing it can. The advantage goes to the company that can simulate every plausible future and choose intentionally.

Ashutosh Bansal
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February 19, 2026

Transformation ROI: Truth or Theatre?

Before you fund a multi-year program, validate the value under real decision conditions. If you don’t model the decisions, you’re writing fiction.

Ashutosh Bansal
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February 12, 2026

The #1 Cause of Planning Failure: Nobody Owns Service vs Margin vs Cash

Service belongs to sales. Margin belongs to finance. Cash belongs to the CFO. Nobody owns the trade-off — and that is the planning failure.

Ashutosh Bansal
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February 5, 2026

Margin Follows Better Decisions: The Transformation Playbook Leaders Miss

Most transformations fail not because of bad tech but because of unowned trade-offs. The playbook leaders miss is the one where decisions earn the margin.

Ashutosh Bansal
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January 29, 2026

A $3M Opportunity Hiding in Plain Sight

$3M of forecast-driven business impact uncovered on a subset of SKUs — without tuning a single model. The opportunity is the architecture, not the math.

Ashutosh Bansal
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January 22, 2026

Autonomous Forecast Optimization — Proven on the M5 Benchmark — Beyond Manual Spreadsheets and Manually Tuned AI

Manual spreadsheets and manually tuned AI both stop at the planner. Autonomous optimization on the M5 benchmark shows what comes next.

Ashutosh Bansal
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