Sydney Procurement Transformation and Technology Summit 2027

Beat the rush and join us early for complimentary barista-made coffee and breakfast.

Procurement is becoming a more strategic part of the business, with better data, AI, and supplier insights helping teams make faster and more informed decisions. But technology alone doesn't make procurement strategic. It also requires the right skills, processes, and connection to wider business priorities.

This opening keynote explores how leading procurement teams are using data and technology to move beyond day-to-day purchasing and create greater value across the organisation.

• What separates a truly strategic procurement function from a tactical one.
• How data and AI are helping procurement make better decisions and deliver greater business value.
• The skills and capabilities procurement teams need to become stronger strategic partners.

Global trade continues to shift, creating new challenges for procurement teams managing costs, suppliers, and supply chain risk. Changing tariffs, trade policies, and geopolitical pressures mean organisations need to be more flexible in how and where they source.

This keynote explores how procurement leaders can prepare for ongoing trade disruption, build more resilient supplier networks, and respond to change without constantly operating in reactive mode.

• How changing tariffs and global trade conditions are reshaping sourcing decisions.
• How organisations are building greater flexibility into their supplier and sourcing strategies.
• What a resilient procurement strategy looks like in an uncertain global environment.

As more suppliers build AI into their products and services, organisations need to better understand and manage the risks that come with it. Procurement teams and supplier contracts have an important role to play in making sure these risks are identified and managed early.

This panel explores how procurement can strengthen supplier agreements, improve due diligence, and manage AI risks across the supply chain.

• Where existing supplier contracts may fall short when it comes to AI risk.
• How procurement teams can identify and manage third-party AI risks.
• What contract clauses and due diligence processes can help strengthen AI oversight.

Over-reliance on a small number of suppliers, or a single supplier for a critical input, has caused real operational pain when disruption hits, and it's often not visible until it's too late.

This case study covers how one organisation identified and actively managed down its supplier concentration risk without disrupting existing relationships unnecessarily.

• How they identified concentration risk that wasn't obvious from the procurement system alone.
• What they actually did to diversify, and the trade-offs involved.
• How they're monitoring concentration risk on an ongoing basis, not just as a one-off review.

A hands-on, interactive session working through a real procurement scenario as a room. Details announced soon.

Most organisations have spend data spread across systems that make genuine analysis painfully manual, hiding both savings opportunities and supplier risk in plain sight.

This case study covers how one procurement team used AI to get a genuinely unified view of spend and supplier risk, and what they found once they could actually see it.

• What their spend data looked like before the AI analysis, and why it hid real risk.
• What they found once they had a genuinely unified view: savings, risk, or both.
• How they operationalised the insights instead of letting them sit in a dashboard.

AI agents are moving into live sourcing and contract workflows, running supplier comparisons, drafting contract terms, and flagging clause risk, often faster than procurement teams can currently govern.

This case study covers a real deployment of AI agents into sourcing and contract management, including what stayed human and what didn't.

• Where AI agents took over meaningful sourcing or contracting work, and what it saved.
• What they deliberately kept human-reviewed in the contracting process.
• How they validated the agents weren't introducing new risk into supplier agreements.

Scope 3 emissions sit largely outside an organisation's direct control, which makes procurement one of the only functions with real leverage to actually shift them, if sustainability criteria genuinely make it into sourcing decisions.

This panel debates how far sustainable procurement has actually progressed beyond supplier questionnaires and reporting.

• Where procurement genuinely has leverage over Scope 3 emissions, versus where it doesn't.
• What's separating sustainable procurement in name from sustainable procurement in sourcing decisions.
• How organisations are balancing sustainability criteria against cost and delivery pressure.

Small-group, discussion-based sessions where you'll work through real procurement challenges with peers in similar roles. Roundtable topics will be announced soon.

Put your knowledge to the test in this fast-paced quiz covering real-world trivia, key concepts, and emerging trends. Compete for bragging rights — and a voucher — as the top scorer takes the crown.

With Australia moving toward mandatory due diligence and stronger penalties for failing to prevent modern slavery, the reporting-only approach many organisations have relied on is no longer going to be enough.

This case study covers how one organisation moved from statement-based reporting to genuine supply chain due diligence ahead of the reforms landing.

• What their modern slavery compliance looked like under the reporting-only approach, and its limits.
• How they built genuine due diligence capability into supplier onboarding and review.
• What they'd prioritise first for an organisation only just starting this shift.

Procurement teams are being asked to do more with less almost everywhere, and AI is being pitched as the answer to nearly every efficiency problem the function has.

This closing keynote gives a clear-eyed view of where AI-driven efficiency gains in procurement are real, and where the promised productivity hasn't shown up yet.

• Where AI has delivered genuine efficiency gains in procurement operations.
• Where the promised productivity hasn't materialised, and why.
• How to make the efficiency case to the business without overselling what AI can currently do.

Most procurement functions have contract and supplier management technology in place, but having the tool and actually using it as the single source of truth are two different things.

This closing session puts the room's real technology maturity to a live vote.

1. Is your contract and supplier data in one system, or spread across several?
2. What's your biggest gap: contract visibility, supplier risk monitoring, or spend analysis?
3. Has a contract or supplier issue caught your organisation off guard in the last year because the information existed but wasn't visible?
4. Do you trust your current supplier risk data enough to act on it without manual verification?
5. Where will your next procurement technology investment go: AI agents, contract management, supplier risk monitoring, or spend analytics?

Unwind with your peers for a couple of drinks on us!

Beat the rush and join us early for complimentary barista-made coffee and breakfast.

Procurement is becoming a more strategic part of the business, with better data, AI, and supplier insights helping teams make faster and more informed decisions. But technology alone doesn't make procurement strategic. It also requires the right skills, processes, and connection to wider business priorities.

This opening keynote explores how leading procurement teams are using data and technology to move beyond day-to-day purchasing and create greater value across the organisation.

• What separates a truly strategic procurement function from a tactical one.
• How data and AI are helping procurement make better decisions and deliver greater business value.
• The skills and capabilities procurement teams need to become stronger strategic partners.

Global trade continues to shift, creating new challenges for procurement teams managing costs, suppliers, and supply chain risk. Changing tariffs, trade policies, and geopolitical pressures mean organisations need to be more flexible in how and where they source.

This keynote explores how procurement leaders can prepare for ongoing trade disruption, build more resilient supplier networks, and respond to change without constantly operating in reactive mode.

• How changing tariffs and global trade conditions are reshaping sourcing decisions.
• How organisations are building greater flexibility into their supplier and sourcing strategies.
• What a resilient procurement strategy looks like in an uncertain global environment.

As more suppliers build AI into their products and services, organisations need to better understand and manage the risks that come with it. Procurement teams and supplier contracts have an important role to play in making sure these risks are identified and managed early.

This panel explores how procurement can strengthen supplier agreements, improve due diligence, and manage AI risks across the supply chain.

• Where existing supplier contracts may fall short when it comes to AI risk.
• How procurement teams can identify and manage third-party AI risks.
• What contract clauses and due diligence processes can help strengthen AI oversight.

Over-reliance on a small number of suppliers, or a single supplier for a critical input, has caused real operational pain when disruption hits, and it's often not visible until it's too late.

This case study covers how one organisation identified and actively managed down its supplier concentration risk without disrupting existing relationships unnecessarily.

• How they identified concentration risk that wasn't obvious from the procurement system alone.
• What they actually did to diversify, and the trade-offs involved.
• How they're monitoring concentration risk on an ongoing basis, not just as a one-off review.

A hands-on, interactive session working through a real procurement scenario as a room. Details announced soon.

Most organisations have spend data spread across systems that make genuine analysis painfully manual, hiding both savings opportunities and supplier risk in plain sight.

This case study covers how one procurement team used AI to get a genuinely unified view of spend and supplier risk, and what they found once they could actually see it.

• What their spend data looked like before the AI analysis, and why it hid real risk.
• What they found once they had a genuinely unified view: savings, risk, or both.
• How they operationalised the insights instead of letting them sit in a dashboard.

AI agents are moving into live sourcing and contract workflows, running supplier comparisons, drafting contract terms, and flagging clause risk, often faster than procurement teams can currently govern.

This case study covers a real deployment of AI agents into sourcing and contract management, including what stayed human and what didn't.

• Where AI agents took over meaningful sourcing or contracting work, and what it saved.
• What they deliberately kept human-reviewed in the contracting process.
• How they validated the agents weren't introducing new risk into supplier agreements.

Scope 3 emissions sit largely outside an organisation's direct control, which makes procurement one of the only functions with real leverage to actually shift them, if sustainability criteria genuinely make it into sourcing decisions.

This panel debates how far sustainable procurement has actually progressed beyond supplier questionnaires and reporting.

• Where procurement genuinely has leverage over Scope 3 emissions, versus where it doesn't.
• What's separating sustainable procurement in name from sustainable procurement in sourcing decisions.
• How organisations are balancing sustainability criteria against cost and delivery pressure.

Small-group, discussion-based sessions where you'll work through real procurement challenges with peers in similar roles. Roundtable topics will be announced soon.

Put your knowledge to the test in this fast-paced quiz covering real-world trivia, key concepts, and emerging trends. Compete for bragging rights — and a voucher — as the top scorer takes the crown.

With Australia moving toward mandatory due diligence and stronger penalties for failing to prevent modern slavery, the reporting-only approach many organisations have relied on is no longer going to be enough.

This case study covers how one organisation moved from statement-based reporting to genuine supply chain due diligence ahead of the reforms landing.

• What their modern slavery compliance looked like under the reporting-only approach, and its limits.
• How they built genuine due diligence capability into supplier onboarding and review.
• What they'd prioritise first for an organisation only just starting this shift.

Procurement teams are being asked to do more with less almost everywhere, and AI is being pitched as the answer to nearly every efficiency problem the function has.

This closing keynote gives a clear-eyed view of where AI-driven efficiency gains in procurement are real, and where the promised productivity hasn't shown up yet.

• Where AI has delivered genuine efficiency gains in procurement operations.
• Where the promised productivity hasn't materialised, and why.
• How to make the efficiency case to the business without overselling what AI can currently do.

Most procurement functions have contract and supplier management technology in place, but having the tool and actually using it as the single source of truth are two different things.

This closing session puts the room's real technology maturity to a live vote.

1. Is your contract and supplier data in one system, or spread across several?
2. What's your biggest gap: contract visibility, supplier risk monitoring, or spend analysis?
3. Has a contract or supplier issue caught your organisation off guard in the last year because the information existed but wasn't visible?
4. Do you trust your current supplier risk data enough to act on it without manual verification?
5. Where will your next procurement technology investment go: AI agents, contract management, supplier risk monitoring, or spend analytics?

Unwind with your peers for a couple of drinks on us!