Lokad vs SAS Intelligent Inventory Management

Lokad is a supply chain decision platform that uses predictive analytics and optimization to guide purchasing, allocation, pricing and prioritization. Its probabilistic forecasts represent possible future scenarios, and it links recommendations to financial impact and business objectives. Lokad automates routine calculations such as reorder quantities, multi-echelon allocations, lead-time adjustments and repair schedules. Users can build decision-generating applications in Envision, Lokad’s supply-chain-focused programming language. The recommended data exchange is file transfer by FTPS or SFTP, with options to push or pull files; native integrations with third-party apps are being phased out. Lokad serves industries including retail, aerospace, automotive, fashion, oil and gas, and manufacturing. The platform runs on the web, and a managed subscription typically includes end-to-end support from one or more Supply Chain Scientists. Pricing is on request. A free trial can be requested by email, and the reduced Envision Playground is available without registration. Lokad was founded in Paris in 2008.

SAS Intelligent Inventory Management is a web-based suite for retail and consumer packaged goods companies planning sizes, purchasing and inventory. It combines SAS Size Optimization and SAS Inventory Optimization, using historical sales, analytics and machine learning to produce size, demand and inventory intelligence. Size features create demand-based profiles, support event scenarios, detect active size ranges and work across hierarchy levels. Products can be grouped by hierarchy or attributes, with new products matched to attribute profiles. Pack recommendations can apply usage and variation constraints, combine packs with bulk and account for supply-chain costs, lifecycle changes and promotions. Inventory planning calculates stock levels across the supply chain and supports replenishment policies based on lead times, costs and target service levels. What-if analysis compares scenarios, proposal costs and policy effects across single- and multi-echelon networks. SAS says the Viya version can deploy on Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services, but SAS Intelligent Inventory Optimization is unavailable on Viya from release 2024.04 onward.