The predictive stock revolution: Artificial intelligence to govern retail inventory in Mexico
Artificial intelligence has ceased to be an experimental innovation project to become the strategic core of retail. At the meeting, organized by the technology company Analyticalways, 200 executives and specialists from the sector gathered in Mexico City to openly discuss the challenges, processes, and real impact of algorithms on inventory and competitiveness.
From the perspective of next+, this meeting highlights that the main bottleneck in the adoption of artificial intelligence applied to retail is not technical, but rather related to data governance and internal culture. Analyticalways' platform, ROIvolution, demonstrates that operational efficiency has a direct impact on retailers' EBITDA. In a highly dynamic Mexican market of more than 435 billion USD, leaders who manage to break down departmental silos and integrate specialized consulting with predictive demand models will be the only ones capable of solving the sector's most complex equation: knowing precisely what to buy, through which channel to distribute it, and when to replenish it to avoid both stockouts and costly inventory overstocking.
Cultural and strategic change: The case of El Palacio de Hierro
Technological transition is not limited to software acquisition but requires a profound organizational reconfiguration. During the forum, María Devesa Sanz, Commercial Planning and Distribution Director at El Palacio de Hierro, presented the transformation process experienced by the luxury department store when implementing artificial intelligence in its inventory management, emphasizing that success lay in how the adoption was approached at the team and internal workflow levels. "For us, offering a luxury experience means anticipating and planning every detail. The most important thing is to use data to make better decisions," Devesa pointed out.
This vision is supported by Pierre Claude Blaise, CEO of the Mexican Online Sales Association (AMVO), who compared the current resistance and challenges in AI adoption with the barriers that omnichannel faced a few years ago. For Blaise, the CEO's vision and the allocated budget are determining factors for capitalizing on the technology's potential in both the short and long term.
Governed data and the advantage of agility
The implementation of algorithmic models requires a solid foundation to avoid critical financial losses. In this regard, the panel experts shared key insights for the sector:
- Visibility and forecasting: Jorge Plasencia García (Advisor to CICEG) warned that a lack of clarity about what happens with products and sales generates massive monetary losses. "Technology is a lens that allows you to know what is happening, make forecasts, and act quickly," he pointed out.
- Information governance: Martha Lazo (General Director of Retail Brands Alliance) emphasized that having reliable, connected, and governed data, aligned with well-defined and documented processes among teams, is a mandatory requirement for technology to achieve commercial goals.
- Business partners over software: Agustín Pérez Hermosillo (Operations & Strategy Manager at Flexi) indicated that retail does not require the most sophisticated tool, but rather an ally who understands business processes, challenges the organization, and accompanies it in decision-making with clear purposes.
According to Amancio Junior, CEO of Analyticalways, the competitive environment will no longer necessarily reward the largest player, the one with the best product, or the one making the largest investment in technology. "The most agile competitor will win: the true advantage lies in the ability to adapt, make decisions quickly, and convert transformation into results," he concluded.
Currently, Mexico is consolidating itself as a market of high strategic relevance for this type of solution. With an estimated value of over 435 billion dollars and a projection exceeding 517 billion dollars for the coming years, according to data from Mordor Intelligence, the optimization of commercial cycles becomes indispensable for sustaining brand growth.