DPW Amsterdam Day 1: AI, Leadership and Agents of Change

DPW Amsterdam ranks among Europe's leading tech and innovation conferences for procurement and supply chain professionals, combining in-person networking with virtual accessibility in one of the continent's most dynamic cities.

Taking place between 7-9 October 2025 at the iconic Beurs van Berlage in Amsterdam's city centre, this year's edition offers an agenda centred around the opportunities and potential of putting AI to work. 

Across multiple presentation stages, intimate meeting areas and dedicated networking lounges, DPW Amsterdam connects global leaders and decision makers shaping the future of procurement and supply chain management.

Procurement at an inflection point

Day 1 opened with a lightshow, a human disco ball and a violinist, before CEO of DPW Amsterdam Herman Knevel took to the stage to set the tone.

Herman expressed his gratitude to people both alongside him in the hall, and those joining virtually. He also highlighted the show floor, packed with the likes of Amazon Business, Zip and Spend HQ, as well as some of the most innovative startups in the industry.

The CEO stressed one key message for everyone at the event: be intentional. He explained that guests should “be intentional when you connect, when you have your meetings and in the live conversations. That is what we are about, and that makes DPW tick.”

Following Herman, the opening keynote was held by Kareem Ayoub, Vice President, AI, Technical Strategy at Google DeepMind. 

He believes that we’re on the precipice of a technological shift potentially more significant than the industrial revolution. But he stressed that, like those leaders who found success back then, it is down to people to harness AI, noting: “Those same visionaries redesigned the entire factory floor and put small motors everywhere. 

“That single insight changed the face of manufacturing forever, and that's what modified 1,000% plus productivity gains. 

“I think we're standing at the same exact inflection point today. We shouldn't see AI as a better calculator or deploy it to our current work faster. It's a scalable source of force and a community for your problem solving capabilities.”

AI dominates this year’s event, with conversations focusing on the real and measurable value from the technology.

GEP’s Global Head of Product Strategy Santosh Nair took the stage to explore this in more detail, delivering a session on the state of agentic AI in procurement.  

He discussed work the company has been doing on understanding AI scaling and maturity, saying: “There’s a bell curve of adoption: roughly 30% are still early and most are running pilots. 

“Those pilots might be quick, but scaling properly means taking it to 20 countries, integrating with five ERPs and handling thousands of supplier and contract records.”

While warning that “not every problem in procurement needs agentic AI”, Santosh set out key areas companies should focus on to build sustainable and scalable AI in procurement: unpack AI for your own context, upskill talent, get data right, deploy an effective AI architecture, and select the right platform. 

With maturity and adoption ongoing, he told the audience to focus on getting the fundamentals right, saying: "You don’t need the ‘best’ AI rockstars — you need data operations, model evaluation, tool proficiency and integration."

Leadership, evolution and the future workplace

The event’s opening panel, Leadership in the Age of Disruption, featured Paul Polman, Former CEO at Unilever, Janelle Aydin, Chief Procurement and Sustainability Officer at Kraft Heinz, and Bertrand Conqueret, Chief Procurement Officer at Henkel. It was moderated by Pierre-Francois Thaler, Co-Founder & Co-CEO of EcoVadis.

Panellists discussed a range of topics, including why it is increasingly difficult to collaborate as a result of geopolitical fragmentation, the need for leaders to balance long and short term goals, the challenges of balancing multiple priorities and why its important to set ambitious goals.  

Closing the panel, Pierre-Francois asked each of the leaders what their call to action would be.

“Leadership is a privilege, and all of us that are in this room probably have that privilege,” said Janelle. “I think we owe it to our teams, to our organisations and to the world to take it very seriously.”

Bertrand followed, saying: “Stand up now. I'm so grateful to the 1,000s of people standing up. It is ongoing. So join the group, join the community and stand up. Stand up to manage all these changes and to learn, to really create that legacy and to really look at future readiness.”

Paul stressed: “You need to entirely say 'I'm here to solve the problems of these 95%'. That requires a certain level of gratitude, reciprocity and generosity. 

“You are not there to be the hero by getting the lowest negotiated contract, you are there to become the hero by writing the future for humanity.”

Grasping the AI opportunity

Leaders need to adapt to change quickly, particularly with the pace of AI adoption. Zip’s Felix Meng and Block’s Mithum Sharma touched on this during their Agents of Change session. 

The pair discussed a groundbreaking new State of Spend report from Zip, a comprehensive survey of over 1,000 digital procurement and finance leaders that reveals crucial insights about the future of AI, talent and strategy. 

It finds that AI is changing the face of people and talent, acting as a factor in 75% of hiring decisions within organisations. Whatsmore, 17% of leaders are now mandated to prove that AI cannot perform a role before approving new hires. 

Elsewhere, Zip finds that AI is transforming spend priorities and driving a shift in resources from people-dependent services to technology. 

“The message for procurement is that if you don’t lead and drive AI adoption and impact, IT will,” said Felix. 

As a result, the pair said, procurement leaders need to rethink staffing and job responsibilities in the future to maximise value, focusing on how AI can automate portions of roles rather than full one-to-one replacements. 

“I believe that 17% will go up more over the next 12-18 months, and that AI will be heavily taken into consideration for any staffing situation,” Felix suggested. 

“I don't think AI will take the job away,” Mithum added, “but it should deeply assist how we support the business, the insights that we bring and how we approach them.”

The conclusion was clear, while AI and data capabilities will be baseline requirements in the future, the technology also offers a sweeping range of opportunities that procurement must grasp with both hands.

The day closed with McKinsey's Senior Partner Mauro Antonio Erriquez, who looked to the future and a reimagined procurement function. who told guests "the next 10 years are going to be see extreme change". 

According to Mauro key procurement themes like resilience and cost avoidance are still critical, but the function must adapt and evolve, particularly around AI, which he said is "here to stay". 

The value add from AI will be enormous, Mauro explained, saying that teams and leaders must be bold enough to "redesign procurement from scratch". 

Leadership is key to this, he explained, closing his session by stating that "winning leaders will forge a new path."