Analyst Insight: The chemical industry is a critical partner to many other industries, with nearly 96 percent of all manufactured products being touched in some way by chemistry. The accelerating pace of product life-cycles, driven by demand for new and innovative products, plays an important role in driving the need for innovation in the chemical industry. To drive innovation and improve business performance, chemical companies are looking at the role of digital transformation as a lever to improving the innovation process. – John Santagate, Research Manager, IDC

Analyst Insight: Most products arrive in the hands of customers through traditional processes. Sales and operations build forecasts, make procurement plans, and order the necessary materials to produce the products, and manufacturing builds the products at the planned production rates. Distribution plans are established to account for some variation in demand, and customers are promised specific delivery dates. If all goes well, the gap between demand and supply at every point in the system will be small. But that rarely happens. –Eduardo Alvarez, principal, PwC, and Rodger Howell, principal, PwC

Analyst Insight: The chemical/energy industry market is ripe with mergers and acquisitions on a global basis as a way for businesses to position themselves for sustained growth. With low fuel prices, foreign competition and an uncertain economy, processors are shuffling their portfolios to offset losses. – Simon Hardy, senior supply chain evangelist, Elemica

Analyst Insight: The global supply chains of today are tremendously complex. They consist of a global network of suppliers, manufacturing facilities, warehouses, distribution centers, and the broader fulfillment network. Supply-chain planning and execution occur across all areas of the supply chain, and the success of operations is largely reliant upon the success of the supply chain. Such complexity and the abundance of touch points are driving the need for modern supply chains to implement an integrated approach to supply-chain management. – John Santagate, research manager, IDC

Analyst Insight: In today's rapidly changing technology and business environments, companies need agility and preparedness to make swift, profit-enhancing strategic and operational decisions. One powerful way to facilitate this is by using finance and risk analytics in the supply chain. Today few companies have enterprise-wide, cross-functional analytical capabilities, but leaders across most industries are developing their understanding of these valuable analytics. They realize they possess a tremendous amount of untapped data and they want to leverage the data with better analytics to optimize the supply chain and contribute more meaningfully to the business discussion. – Bob Bishop, Principal, PwC; Glen Goldbach, Principal, PwC; and Corey Gallon, Director, PwC

In a quick counter-salvo, Amazon has announced it's lowering the free shipping threshold for non-Prime members from $49 to $35, a response to Walmart's move earlier this month.

Companies today need to cut costs, speed up fulfillment processes and manage growth. All the while providing "the perfect order."

Analyst Insight: Exclusive in-house brands or comprehensive private-label ranges are increasingly being used to execute a differentiation strategy. Exclusive differentiation is one of the key elements to creating an exciting and productive retail environment. It is vital to explore the importance of exclusive and private-label brands as a key differentiator in apparel retailing today. – Nancy Marino, Senior Vice President, Tompkins International