Walmart is using an AI chatbot developed by Pactum AI Inc. to automate vendor negotiations. The software helps the company automate supplier negotiations by feeding its budget and needs to AI, which then communicates with human sellers to close deals instead of a buying team. Walmart’s senior VP for international operations, Darren Carithers, notes that the use of AI has reduced negotiating time from weeks or months to days, with a success rate of about 68% of suppliers approached and an average savings of 3% on contracts since the programme’s introduction. Walmart has adopted several AI tools in recent years, including a partnership with Microsoft Corp. in 2018 to work on AI and other strategic tech. AI is helping overburdened procurement teams, and the potential is that soon any company can use AI for a problem that normally requires a whole procurement team to handle, says Tim Baarslag, a senior researcher at CWI.

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