It was a pleasure to participate in one of procurement’s biggest events of the year: ISM World 2025. The event featured leaders in supply chain—from Fortune 500 companies managing vast networks of suppliers, to innovators redefining how to identify supply chain risk.

At the heart of the event, we spotlighted our FHR Solution in the Innovation Park in the Risk & ESG section. Supply chain professionals stopped by to see how top companies use RapidRatings’ FHR to detect the financial risk of their suppliers, most notably private suppliers where visibility is limited. Attendees were especially intrigued to learn that RapidRatings sources financial risk data directly from financial statements, making it the most accurate solution on the market. It was a pleasure to demonstrate the industry’s leading financial risk detector.

Most exciting of the two-day event was when our Executive Chairman James Gellert gave a keynote session alongside Resilinc CEO Kamal Ahluwalia. With over 100 supply chain professionals in attendance, the session sparked thoughtful dialogue and brought enthusiastic feedback.

James and Kamal opened the session discussing today’s risk landscape. Tariffs, macroeconomic uncertainty, geopolitical tensions, and black swan events are creating a dangerous cocktail of supply chain risk. James unveiled RapidRatings’ exclusive data on our Tariff Stress Testing, where we showed the audience how 90-day pause tariffs are increasing risk among U.S. suppliers, and how retaliatory tariffs will greatly exacerbate the situation. Audience members were especially engaged with this portion, as a big theme of the event was how risk professionals are managing tariff shocks.

James and Kamal went on to share strategies for mitigating these risks, including increasing scope on geographic exposure, using financial health to underpin all risk areas, and collaborating with suppliers to better understand how their financial health may be impacted by tariffs, especially for private suppliers.

One Chief Procurement Officer from a major firm shared:

“This presentation has opened our eyes to the importance of financial health monitoring. Private company deterioration will undoubtedly increase under tariffs. This makes us re-consider our current strategies - do we have the insights to know if we’re working with the right suppliers—and making the right decisions—for supply chain continuity?”

Along with tariffs, the event overall focused on AI and its role in future supply chain management. Risk professionals and providers discussed how they can integrate the most transformative strategies in their risk programs to ensure they stay ahead in the changing industry.

Overall, the event was one for the books. We were proud to arm companies with data analytics and insights, and to provide our perspective into managing today’s risks. But more so, we were proud to hear directly from the frontlines and better understand what is needed to ensure companies are resilient against supply chain risk.

Thank you to ISM and the wonderful participants – we enjoyed the time!

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