In an era of relentless economic uncertainty and continuous supply chain shocks, modern procurement leaders are forced to strike a delicate balance between short-term cost savings and long-term resilience. Speaking to Procurement Magazine ahead of Amazon Business Exchange, Amy Worth, Director, Amazon Business UK & Public Sector Customers EU, explores how leading buyers are navigating these challengesby utilising digital marketplaces to secure reliable supplier backups.

Amy looks at real-world AI applications, such as proactive spend anomaly monitoring, that curb rogue purchasing, look at how data-driven guided buying policies help organisations hit ambitious local sourcing targets and discuss shifting procurement into a highimpact, strategic function.

With higher inflation and economic uncertainty, are procurement teams focusing more on quick short-term savings or building long-term backup plans? I think what they’ re really focused on is removing friction and driving efficiencies – making sure that they are getting good value for money, both from a product perspective, but also in terms of supply consolidation and removing friction from the procurement process. That helps them both now and in the future, so I would say it’ s probably a mixture of both. Digitisation of procurement has been ongoing for the last 10 years and that has really supported that. Nearly half of procurement decision-makers cite managing efficiency as their biggest challenge. What I really do hear from customers is that they’ re looking for efficiencies; they’ re trying to drive savings.

70 August 2026