Fairmarkit

AgileOne's Beyond the Horizon executive forum in London wasn't just another procurement event. It raised the bar, exploring how procurement, workforce strategy, and technology are fundamentally reshaping how work is sourced and delivered. Discussions highlighted how procurement is at the center of it all, not just managing suppliers, but shaping how work and the workforce come together.

Every World Cup follows the same arc. The group stage is where the field gets sorted, some easy wins, a few surprises, everybody still technically alive. Then the knockout rounds start, and suddenly every decision matters. One call and you're through. One miss and you're on a plane home. Sourcing works the same way. The RFP goes out, the bids come in, and for a minute it feels like progress. That's the group stage.

Procurement in 2026 is operating in a business environment where volatility is structural, not episodic. Inflation pressure, supplier pricing power, geopolitical disruption, and shifting trade and tariff dynamics have made “steady state” planning unrealistic. Procurement leaders are being measured on outcomes that are both more aggressive and less predictable: deliver more savings, manage more risk, and move faster, often without incremental headcount.

Last week's sourcing data told an interesting story. This edition of The Source Report breaks down what companies are actually buying last week — from multi-year strategic contracts to the high-volume maintenance work that keeps operations running. Strategic Service RFPs: Multi-Year, High-Stakes The largest events last week reflect how enterprises are committing to long-term partners across logistics, infrastructure, and energy.

Today we're launching Total Agentic Sourcing, and the results our customers are already seeing using the Fairmarkit platform are the right place to start. Boeing has eliminated 115,000 hours of sourcing cycle time annually across a procurement ecosystem spanning dozens of teams and categories. Emirates Flight Catering cut sourcing cycle time by 85 percent for MRO contracts where flight schedules are fixed, food safety is non-negotiable, and demand shifts daily.

Full integration enables competitive bidding natively inside procurement orchestration. More events, faster cycles, broader savings. Fairmarkit and Zip have teamed up to directly connect Zip's AI-driven intake and orchestration capabilities with Fairmarkit's autonomous sourcing platform. The integration enables enterprises to automate workflows, absorb request volume, and remove manual tasks across the Source-to-Pay process, from initial supplier request through competitive award and payment.

Let’s start with a procurement truth that’s going to sting a little (in a loving way): Your procurement strategy should not be a hostage negotiation with your tech stack. And yet… for a lot of teams, that’s exactly what it feels like. Not because procurement leaders are lacking vision. Not because teams aren’t capable of strategic thinking. It’s because, over time, strategy tends to get shaped by what your systems are willing to do easily. That shift almost never happens in one big moment.

Christmas was a little different this year - of course now with 4 who are 5 and under, there was more shrieking about reindeer leaving carrots everywhere, more tiny toy accessories that we plan to throw out immediately, and more large play structures that the elves make, but leave it in our hands to set up at 12:30am the night before (full transparency, my ability to build toys is at about a 3rd grade level = all credit to Rach and my Dad (Papa D) But outside that, what made it different was...

If 2024 was the year everyone talked about AI, then 2025 was the year procurement teams actually put it to work, in real workflows, on real categories, solving real business problems (and occasionally reminding us that change is definitely a team sport).

Bringing up “autonomous procurement” at work can be… a journey. Some people light up. Some squint. Some quietly calculate whether they should update their résumé. And a few just hope it means fewer status updates before lunch. That mix of reactions is completely normal. Anytime new technology enters the picture, especially the kind with the word autonomous in it, people want to understand what’s changing, what’s improving, and whether they should be worried.