Podcast Summary: B2B Agility with Greg Kihlström™ — Episode #57
“Supply Chain as Competitive Advantage with Salvatore Lombardo, Coupa”
Date: August 19, 2025
Host: Greg Kihlström
Guest: Salva (Salvatore) Lombardo, Chief Product and Technology Officer, Coupa
Episode Overview
This episode dives deep into the role of supply chain strategy as a core component of competitive agility for B2B brands. Host Greg Kihlström and guest Salva Lombardo explore how modern supply chains — once considered behind-the-scenes or operational matters — are now critical levers for staying competitive amid a world of unpredictable disruptions (like geopolitical unrest, regulatory changes, and climate challenges). The conversation zeroes in on building resilience, leveraging data and technology (especially AI), and shifting traditional business mindsets, making the episode highly relevant for B2B leaders navigating complexity in 2025.
Key Discussion Points & Insights
1. Salva Lombardo’s Background and Coupa’s Role
[02:15]
- Background: 20 years in supply chain and procurement, with experience at SAP and, more recently, as Chief Product and Technology Officer at Coupa.
- Role at Coupa: Heads product, engineering, and cloud operations, ensuring solution delivery to clients.
2. What’s Missing in Modern Supply Chain Resilience
[03:22]
Salva identifies three recurring gaps in how brands handle supply chain disruptions:
- Supplier Risk Profiling: Many brands fail to “judge rightly [the] risk profiles of my suppliers.”
“If you don’t do a really diligent way on judging your suppliers...that’s a part which I’m seeing as a pattern.” — Salva Lombardo [03:36]
- Automation of Supply Chain Problem Recognition: Limited automation in detecting geopolitical or climate disruptions in real-time.
- Rapid Simulation Capabilities: Brands struggle to quickly simulate and analyze the impact of sudden changes (like tariffs), resulting in slower reactions than needed.
“The simulation takes partly longer than maybe the reactions you should have.” — Salva Lombardo [04:53]
3. Why Supply Chain Strategy Matters — Speed & Agility
[05:52]
- Agility Is Speed: A well-defined supply chain strategy enables rapid adaptation to changes.
- Strategic Layers: Beyond supply chain, brands need supplier, spend, and category strategies.
“If you don’t have a strategy... your reaction speed is not as quick as your competition speed.” — Salva Lombardo [06:28]
4. The Importance of Diversification & Data Transparency
[07:16]
- Transparency as a Foundation: Most brands lack true transparency in sourcing and spend data.
- Diversification Mistake: Over-reliance on single regions or suppliers without granular insight into supply diversification is common.
“The transparency of your business in data points, in figures, in number of suppliers per material... that’s what I see, in 9 of 10 cases, not being there.” — Salva Lombardo [07:46]
- Digitalization Isn’t Enough: It’s less about digitization and more about having “the right tools and system support” to access and act on real data.
5. Coupa’s Approach to Supply Chain Technology
[09:22]
- End-to-End Platform: Coupa covers supply chain, sourcing, contracting, payables (procure-to-pay), and supplier networks.
- Business Spend Platform: Provides a unified environment where spend can be tracked from strategy to transaction.
- Real-Time Data & Networked Insights: Suppliers update profiles and certifications, automating risk and opportunity management.
6. The Role of AI in Proactive Supply Chain Management
[10:57]
- AI as a Business Value Creator (Not Just Tech):
“Honestly brands should not worry about the word AI because the word AI itself is a technology, it’s a wonderful technology disruption. That’s it. But the disruption itself is no value yet for the business… it’s your vendor which needs to leverage AI and then deliver for you the right SaaS services.” — Salva Lombardo [11:09]
- AI Enables Predictability: AI helps brands make the unpredictable more predictable, going beyond mere automation.
- Real-World Impact: Example: AI-driven supplier onboarding, where agents dynamically verify certifications and risk profiles, transforming onboarding from a bottleneck to a “non-event.”
“Imagine... an intelligent AI agent helps suppliers to onboard because all this immense data set [is] anyway there… a wonderful profile with an AI agent will be created.” — Salva Lombardo [13:57]
7. What AI Actually Changes for Business Leaders
[14:38]
- Operational Transformation: Drastic time-savings in recalculating and simulating logistics scenarios (e.g., tariff changes).
“Simulation… at the moment [is] 50 to 100 times quicker. For example, logistic network scenario calculation. By changing one parameter which in [the] past took us maybe a day, we can do now in a very quick way.” — Salva Lombardo [16:00]
- AI as the New User Experience:
“AI will be the new user experience… one day the menu and module way of working… will disappear.” — Salva Lombardo [17:02]
- Conversational Agents: Envisions interacting with “Agent Coupa Navi” instead of hunting through software menus, making supply chain analytics instantly actionable through natural language.
- Instant Data Insight → Immediate Action: The future of procurement is “data insight and then action.”
8. Leadership Mindset Shift for Agility
[15:42, 19:33]
- Leaders must embrace:
- Accelerated, day-to-day recalculations and decisions
- Trust in AI and digital agents for even strategic procurement
- A break from “the way we’ve always done it” toward a more dynamic, scenario-based management style
9. Salva’s Personal Agility Routines
[19:33]
- Unplugging & Deep Reading: Regularly puts away his phone for an hour to read industry papers, refreshing for new challenges and innovation.
“Still as being a really front runner in software, I love to read… It just gets me back into my brain working... That charges me for the next 24 hours.” — Salva Lombardo [19:37]
Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments
-
On supply chain risk:
“Do I really judge rightly risk profiles of my suppliers?... If you don’t do a really diligent way on judging your suppliers...that’s a part which I’m seeing as a pattern.” — Salva Lombardo [03:36]
-
On agility:
“If you do not have a supply chain strategy, are you really prepared to speedy enough, react on certain changes... If you don’t have it, don’t, you know, be not surprised that you can’t react quickly.” — Salva Lombardo [05:54]
-
On AI’s real business value:
“The disruption itself is no value yet for the business, Greg. And the value is now my duty as a technology provider, as a vendor for software and for SaaS to turn AI into a business value.” — Salva Lombardo [11:11]
-
On the future of user experience:
“I’m an absolutely believer...that one day the menu and module way of working how we are used today...will disappear...for easy to medium complex tasks. A conversational AI agent...will be that intelligent that you don’t need to do anything except of talking or typing with this agent and doing the rest of your work.” — Salva Lombardo [17:00]
Important Timestamps
- 02:15 — Salva Lombardo’s background & role at Coupa
- 03:22 — Three critical gaps in current supply chain risk management
- 05:52 — Why supply chain strategy is a core tool for competitiveness
- 07:16 — Common mistakes in supply chain diversification & importance of data transparency
- 09:22 — Coupa’s platform and supply chain solution overview
- 10:57 — AI’s value in making business more proactive, more than just a buzzword
- 13:57 — Example: AI-enabled supplier onboarding
- 15:42 — Business implications of better AI-driven prediction and reaction speed
- 17:02 — Vision for conversational AI as the next generation of user experience
- 19:33 — Salva’s practice for staying agile as a leader
Summary Takeaway
This episode illuminates the evolving role of the supply chain in B2B agility. Key success factors are transparency, speed, and the ability to convert cutting-edge technologies like AI into real, everyday business value. As traditional silos break down, and the unpredictable becomes the norm, only those who combine robust data, flexible strategies, and the courage to rethink habits will be able to leverage supply chains for true competitive advantage.