Relex Solutions has launched its cloud-based software for category management in procurement, Relex Space for Category Management. Category management is an approach to procurement where similar products and services are grouped into categories, in order to consolidate spend and maximize savings.

Relex, which provides an online supply chain and retail planning platform, says the interface empowers retailers to optimize merchandising plans to deliver the right products at the right time and place, meeting consumer demand, while maximizing sales and profitability.  

Relex Space for Category Management strategically optimizes shelf space allocation and provides insights into category adjacencies, ensuring that popular categories have enough space to meet customer demand. Automating and optimizing updates to planograms — a diagram or model that indicates the placement of retail products on shelves in order to maximize sales — using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can reduce time-consuming manual processes and enable retailers to reflect current sales trends, customer preferences, and seasonal variations. 

The company says Relex Space for Category Management also fosters cross-functional collaboration, allowing supply chain and merchandising teams to plan and develop their category management strategy, and make decisions accordingly. By considering space, labor, inventory, and forecast data, the software aims to allow planners to assess true cost-to-serve and how to grow revenue.