If the early 2020s were about firefighting, 2026 will be about rewiring. Procurement is stepping out of “crisis response mode” and into something more deliberate: AI‑enabled, data‑literate, regulation‑ready, and genuinely strategic.
In last year’s Kodiak Hub webinar and blog on 13 Procurement Trends in 2025 & beyond, we talked about:
AI & GenAI moving from hype to real use cases
The “Excel Exodus” and better Supplier Information Management (SIM)
A “Legislative Tsunami” of ESG and due‑diligence rules
De‑globalization, rightshoring, and supply chain resilience
End‑to‑end SRM and strategic procurement
Fast‑forward: industry data now confirms that CPOs are betting big on digital and AI, and that those who lean in are already outperforming their peers. Procurement Magazine Regulations continue to tighten, supply chains remain fragile, and expectations on procurement keep rising.
So what’s next?
Below are 10 procurement trends you should plan for in 2026—with an eye toward how they can shape your roadmap and your webinar agenda.
Before we jump into 2026, a quick scorecard on some of the trends we called out for 2025:
AI & GenAI everywhere: CPO surveys now show digital and AI capabilities as decisive differentiators, with early adopters reporting better savings, risk management, and stakeholder satisfaction. Procurement Magazine+1
Excel Exodus & SIM: Digitalization budgets continued to climb; many teams finally started consolidating supplier data into proper SIM/SRM platforms, not just shared drives.
Legislative Tsunami: ESG and due‑diligence laws (CSRD, CSDDD, similar regimes elsewhere) pushed supplier traceability and documentation up the agenda. KPMG and others now explicitly list sustainability regulation as a key supply chain risk driver. KPMG
Rightshoring & resilience: Nearshoring, friend‑shoring, and multi‑sourcing became mainstream levers, not just slideware, as tariffs, wars and logistics disruptions continued.
End‑to‑end SRM & strategic procurement: More leadership attention, more cross‑functional influence—and a clearer shift from “PO factory” to orchestrator of risk, sustainability, and innovation.
In other words: the themes were real. 2026 won’t replace them; it will intensify them.
2024–2025 were the years of pilots, POCs, and “AI labs.” In 2026, leading teams will stop treating AI as a side project and start building AI‑native operating models:
GenAI copilots embedded in sourcing events, contract reviews, and supplier meetings
Agent‑style workflows that watch data, flag anomalies, and suggest next best actions
Automated drafting of RFx packs, QBR decks, and negotiation playbooks from live data
Consulting and CPO surveys now agree: digital and AI leaders are pulling ahead, not just experimenting. Procurement Magazine+1 In 2026, the question shifts from “Should we use AI?” to “Which processes are AI‑first by design?”
The AI boom hasn’t been painless. A 2025 EY survey found that nearly all large companies deploying AI reported some risk‑related financial loss—from compliance failures to flawed outputs and bias. Those with stronger “Responsible AI” frameworks performed better across sales, cost savings, and employee satisfaction. Reuters
For procurement, 2026 will be the year of:
AI usage policies and guardrails for sourcing, contracts, and supplier evaluation
Clear “human in the loop” principles, especially for high‑impact decisions
Documented lineage for AI‑assisted analyses and recommendations
Alignment with evolving regulations and internal risk committees
Trend #1 (AI everywhere) only works if trend #2 (governance) keeps up.
Risk is no longer a quarterly slide. Between climate events, cyber attacks, and geopolitics, continuous supplier risk monitoring is quickly becoming the norm:
Real‑time feeds on sanctions, ESG controversies, cyber incidents, and financial stress
Integrated views that combine external signals with OTIF, quality, and audit findings
Scenario simulation: “What if this tier‑2 supplier fails?” “What if this corridor closes?”
KPMG’s recent supply chain outlook highlights regulatory, geopolitical, and AI‑related risks as key pressure points for 2025 and beyond. KPMG Expect 2026 to push procurement into a 24/7 risk‑orchestrator role, not just a buyer that escalates when something breaks.
The “Legislative Tsunami” is starting to consolidate, but it’s not going away. Instead, 2026 will be about operationalising it:
Supplier‑level carbon, labour, and human‑rights data becoming standard fields
Contract clauses that tie ESG commitments to performance and remedies
Bigger focus on credible evidence: third‑party assurance, audits, and traceability
Procurement will increasingly own the question: “Can we prove this supplier aligns with our commitments—and not just on paper?” Data, not slogans, will win.
We said 2025 would be the year teams finally left spreadsheet‑only supplier management. Many did—but plenty are still half‑in, half‑out. 2026 will see a harder push toward:
True single supplier records across ERPs, S2P, SRM, and risk tools
Automated validations (entity, banking, sanctions, certificates) at onboarding
Persistent enrichment from performance data, audits, and risk feeds
Without this, AI and advanced analytics simply won’t deliver. McKinsey’s work on procurement value leakage with gen AI repeatedly emphasises that data plumbing and clean inputs are the make‑or‑break. McKinsey & Company SIM isn’t glamorous—but it’s the fuel.
“Rip and replace” mega‑suites are losing ground to composable, API‑first ecosystems:
ERP as the backbone, surrounded by best‑of‑breed SRM, risk, sourcing, CLM, and analytics
Real‑time integrations that avoid double keying and shadow data
Event‑driven architecture: a risk change in SRM triggers a contract review or PO hold upstream
Deloitte’s 2025 CPO survey points to digital leaders building vertically integrated solutions and flexible stacks rather than relying on a single monolith. Procurement Magazine In 2026, integration quality may matter more than any single feature.
Category management is back—but smarter:
Continuous refresh of market intelligence and should‑cost models
Micro‑segmentation within categories (by risk, ESG profile, innovation potential)
Structured playbooks that combine commercial, technical, and risk levers
Instead of static three‑year category strategies, 2026 will see “living strategies” that update as data flows in (index movements, capacity changes, supplier innovation, regulatory shifts). Category managers become portfolio managers, not one‑time storytellers.
Supplier portals are evolving from “upload your documents here” to collaboration hubs:
Shared improvement roadmaps, CAPAs, and innovation pipelines
Joint dashboards showing performance, risk and ESG targets
Frictionless communication for RFx, Q&A, change requests, and product development
As AI and automation remove transactional friction, human relationships matter more at the points of trust and innovation. 2026 will reward organisations that treat suppliers less like vendors and more like strategic partners—while still holding them to evidence‑based standards.
Deloitte’s latest CPO survey highlights digital literacy and AI fluency as core skills for tomorrow’s teams, not fringe capabilities. Deloitte In 2026, expect more roles like:
Procurement data translators who turn analytics into action
Automation and AI product owners for source‑to‑pay workflows
Supplier risk & ESG specialists embedded in category teams
Soft skills—stakeholder management, storytelling, negotiation—remain crucial. But the baseline will be higher: comfort with data, tools, and change will be part of the job description, not an optional extra.
The through‑line of all these trends: procurement’s scope of impact keeps growing. CPOs are now asked to:
Protect the business from supply and cyber risk
Deliver savings and cost avoidance in volatile markets
Hit sustainability and diversity targets
Accelerate innovation, speed‑to‑market, and resilience
Deloitte calls this a “tipping point,” where procurement becomes a transformative agent of change powered by digital and AI. PR Newswire In 2026, the winners will be the teams that embrace this shift and deliberately design their operating model—people, process, and tech—to match.
You don’t need to chase all 10 trends at once. Use them as a menu:
Pick 2–3 “must win” themes for 2026 (e.g., AI operating model, SIM 2.0, risk & resilience).
Map current maturity (process, data, tech, skills) honestly.
Define 90‑day sprints: pilots, quick wins, and proof‑of‑value (not multi‑year moonshots).
Assign clear owners for each theme—don’t leave AI, risk, or SIM as “everyone’s job.”
Co‑create with suppliers and stakeholders: the trends that stick are the ones you implement with your ecosystem, not to it.
If you’re turning this into a webinar, each trend (or cluster of trends) can become a segment:
Segment 1: AI & Responsible AI (Trends 1–2)
Segment 2: Risk, ESG & Resilience (Trends 3–4)
Segment 3: Data, SIM & Composable Tech (Trends 5–6)
Segment 4: Strategy, Collaboration & Talent (Trends 7–9)
Segment 5: Procurement’s New Role (Trend 10 + Q&A)
Trends only matter if they shape decisions.
In 2026, procurement has a rare window: budget and attention are there, digital tools are maturing fast, and the mandate is broader than ever. The organisations that win will:
Treat data and SIM as strategic infrastructure
Use AI responsibly—with guardrails, not blind trust
Build continuous risk and ESG oversight into supplier management
Design composable stacks instead of monoliths
Invest in people and skills as much as platforms
Use this list as your blueprint—for your content, your webinar, and most importantly, your 2026 procurement roadmap.