Presumably SAP's models encode information about past supply chain behaviors/events, along with any actual data that the customer may have already input.

At least that's what their documentation claims: https://wiki.scn.sap.com/wiki/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=7...

But as the old saying goes, "There's lies, damned lies, and then there's statistics". But I'm sure that this an area where good neural nets could be put to enormous advantage.

The question the author raises with good reason is "Do we want to optimize only for supply chain efficiency?"

BTW, the author is a 'she', Miriam Posner.