Unilever Integrated AI Agents Into Operations
The company has deployed eight AI agents to automate order workflows across its global supply chain network.
Updated on Sept. 28, 2026 in Artificial Intelligence
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Unilever has integrated a suite of AI agents into its customer operations to automate manual tasks like order processing. This deployment, which currently includes eight agents, aims to improve agility across a network of 200,000 customers and 70,000 products.
Why it matters
By automating high-volume workflows, Unilever is attempting to manage the complexity of its global supply chain more effectively. This shift enables the firm to balance granular operational oversight with the flexibility needed to scale across diverse markets.
The AI agent Nova functions by ingesting email communications, interpreting customer context, and automatically inputting data into the SAP operating system. This sits alongside existing machine learning models that now manage forecasting for 45 billion euros of the firm's total turnover.
The players
Unilever
A multinational consumer goods corporation that maintains a massive global supply chain and operates a dedicated customer operations team of 6,000 people.
Kinaxis
An Ottawa-based software provider specializing in supply chain planning and management solutions that partners with large enterprises to digitize operations.
The details
Unilever utilizes machine learning to automate forecasting and planning, achieving a 60% automation rate for forecasting and a 90% rate for planning processes. The company maps global process designs to digital taxonomies, which allows systems to monitor compliance across 200 warehouses. To support this, nearly 2,000 employees are undergoing training to build their own custom agents through the DigiOps program, which requires 150 hours of coursework over nine months.
Timeline
2022: Unilever established the formal customer operations function.
September 28, 2026: The company confirmed the global status of its AI agent rollout.
The Tech Race
Unilever is moving to automate high-volume transaction tasks that previously relied on manual human intervention within the SAP ERP operating system. This approach follows a broader industry trend of enterprises embedding specialized agents directly into core legacy back-end infrastructure.
The move to AI-driven order processing is designed to increase throughput for the 200,000 customers currently served by the company. As these agents become more prevalent, partners should expect faster response times for routine order inquiries and updates.
The takeaway
Unilever is shifting from manual order entry to agentic automation to handle its massive product and customer volume. Watch for the upcoming North American deployment of the Nova agent to see if the firm reports improved operational cycle times compared to the current baseline.
What happens next
The company's AI agent Nova is scheduled to go live in the North American market in the near future.
Further reading
For broader trends in enterprise adoption, visit the Artificial Intelligence section.
Source note: This article includes information reported by Consumer Goods Technology.
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