A new era for AI-powered retail planning: Anaplan acquires Syrup Tech

What the deal means for retail planning leadership

Anaplan + Syrup Tech: strengthening the AI forecasting engine

On 9 September 2025, Anaplan announced that it had acquired Syrup Tech for an undisclosed amount. According to the official release:

• Syrup’s AI forecasting engine will be embedded within Anaplan’s best-in-class scenario-planning and analysis platform.
• This integration allows retailers and global enterprises to better plan, buy, price and allocate with confidence — even amid complex data environments.
• Syrup’s proprietary neural-network models use granular sales data, product imagery and external signals (such as social sentiment or weather patterns) to deliver highly accurate forecasting outcomes.

Why it matters: inventory optimisation, retail planning & connected planning

For retail-intensive businesses, the acquisition means:

• Improved forecasting precision for new items, merchandise assortments and demand sensing.
• Smarter inventory decisions, including allocation and replenishment planning, leading to faster sell-through and lower inventory costs.
• Dynamic pricing and markdown optimisation, enabling greater margin impact via demand shaping.
• Stronger resilience and agility in the value chain, responding faster to market shifts and supply-chain disruptions, aligned with integrated business planning (IBP) principles.

Combined, these capabilities support the concept of connected planning, aligning finance, supply chain, merchandising, sales and operations under a unified data-driven planning architecture.

Strategic implications for CIOs, CTOs and C-Suite executives

For the C-Suite: strategic messaging and competitive advantage

From a strategic standpoint, this acquisition sends a strong signal: Anaplan is doubling down on being the platform for digital transformation in enterprise planning. For CIOs or CTOs in large organisations (especially in retail/consumer sectors), this means:

• Investing in a platform that supports AI forecasting, not just static models.
• Embracing an architecture that enables cross-functional planning, moving beyond silos in finance, supply chain, merchandising.
• Enhancing decision-making speed and agility, which is critical in today’s volatile environment.

To reinforce this messaging with a partner perspective:

For Asia-Pacific region and large retailers

Given our work with large retailers and digital transformation in Asia-Pacific, the acquisition strengthens our Anaplan’s retail planning credentials, which may create new value propositions for APAC clients facing omni-channel complexity.

For solution architects and implementation teams

From a delivery standpoint:

• Implementation teams should evaluate how Syrup’s forecasting and allocation modules integrate into Anaplan’s existing modules (demand planning, inventory, IBP).
• Ensure data-readiness: vast historical sales data, product imagery, external signals must be prepared to exploit the full power of AI forecasting.
• Change management is key: moving from traditional planning to AI-driven, integrated planning requires stakeholder alignment across finance, supply chain and merchandising.