5 Must-Have Features for Supply Chain Risk Management Software in 2025

The 2020s have seen a dramatic explosion of disruptions that threaten global supply chains. From the COVID-19 pandemic to the current, highly contentious trade environment, the past half-decade alone has seen manufacturers and suppliers navigate everything from supply shortages and shipping container snarls to climate disasters and geopolitical crises. According to a survey conducted by Interos that queried 750 companies with annual revenues of at least $500 million, the average yearly losses stemming from supply chain disruptions during the first three years of the 2020s was nearly $150 million.

While some manufacturers continue to tackle the challenges of 2025 using the tools of 2008—namely excel sheets, email, word-of-mouth, and more—many are turning to sophisticated, supply-chain specific software to address these challenges.

Enter the rise of supply chain risk management software. 

Supply Chain Risk Management Software Should Serve a Two-Fold Purpose

Supply chain risk management software offers a two-fold purpose: helping companies address immediate risks while equipping them to proactively identify and mitigate future disruptions.

To deliver on this, the software must support two core functions:

• Informational
• Operational

Information-Driven Supply Chain Risks

The informational component is relatively straightforward. Companies need timely, relevant insights delivered in a clear, actionable format to understand what's at risk. For example, if a fire breaks out at a subtier supplier’s facility, supply chain risk management software should quickly show which components are impacted, what products depend on them, and what alternative sources are available. Access to this kind of clarity enables teams to make fast, informed decisions in moments of disruption.

Operation-Driven Supply Chain Risks

The operational piece is just as critical but often overlooked. Many supply chain risks aren’t external—they’re internal, buried in siloed processes or conflicting data systems. When procurement and engineering teams rely on different compliance data or can't trace the origin of a part due to fragmented systems, delays occur, not because the information doesn't exist, but because it's disjointed and hard to interpret. Risk isn’t just about the threat itself, but how long it takes to understand and act on it.

In short, the best supply chain risk management software doesn’t just provide information, it also ensures that information can move through the organization efficiently, with the right level of clarity, ownership, and urgency.

In the sections that follow, we break down five key features supply chain risk management software must offer to meet these needs in 2025 and beyond.

Supply Chain Risk Management Software’s Five-Core Needs

To meet both the informational and operational needs of today’s global supply chains, supply chain risk management software must offer features that help companies improve visibility, streamline internal processes, and take decisive action during disruptions. Some lean more heavily on delivering timely, relevant insights (informational), while others focus on enabling efficient internal coordination and execution (operational):

1. Supply Chain Mapping and Visibility (Informational + Operational)
2. Data Centralization (Operational)
3. Supplier Risk Assessments (Informational)
4. Real-Time Risk Monitoring & Sensing (Informational)
5. Sub-Tier Data Intelligence (Informational + Operational)

1. Supply Chain Visibility (Information & Operational)

As we’ve discussed in the past, any effective SCRM program must begin with visibility into the supply chain. In order to identify and assess threats, businesses need to be able to see as deep into their supply chain as possible, including not only direct (tier 1) suppliers, but also the indirect manufacturers that often run two, three, and sometimes four tiers deep. 

Supply chain visibility is largely realized through supply chain mapping—the intricate, often painstaking process of mapping out direct and sub-tier suppliers, manufacturing sites, and the relationships between supply chain stakeholders. The visibility achieved through these maps allows OEMs and other organizations to develop a wide array of risk mitigation strategies, including supplier assessments, sub-tier risk evaluations, dual sourcing, and efforts at greater transparency. In this way, supply chain visibility is a foundational part of SCRM, and consequently an invaluable feature in any SCRM software. 

2. Data Centralization (Operational)

It may sound elementary, but effective SCRM software in 2025 needs to be able to support, consolidate, and analyze a wide variety of different types of data. If you’re an automotive OEM, for example, you need an SCRM platform capable of handling supplier intelligence; geographical information; bills of materials (BOMs), manufacturing part numbers (MPNs) and approved vendor lists (AVLs); and sanctions details, among other types of data. 

Further, the most competitive SCRM software provides an intuitive, easily navigable dashboard where users can seamlessly move between different forms of data, comparing suppliers, sites, parts, and other supply chain variables. This broad, highly supportive data structure enables individuals and teams across departments to collaborate and operate from the same shared source of truth when making decisions and developing risk management strategies. 

Finally, businesses should be assessing potential SCRM platforms for their customizability. Different companies and industries prioritize different kinds of information and intelligence, and tools with built-in flexibility allow organizations to reconfigure dashboards, tables, and fields to suit their own internal priorities and protocols.

3. Supplier Risk Assessment (Informational)

While there are a range of different risks in supply chains, arguably the single most important of these variables is suppliers. Suppliers are essential to a business’s manufacturing continuity, but their own stability is not a guarantee. These manufacturers have a slew of unique vulnerabilities, including financial health, trade compliance, ESG performance, and any potential legal proceedings that could jeopardize their future operations. Any of these risk factors can threaten a supplier’s ability to keep their sites running seamlessly and deliver product on deadline.

For supply chain risk management software, being able to execute effective supplier risk assessments is an imperative. SCRM programs should have advanced evaluation tools for assessing manufacturers, including models that incorporate key risk factors and potential sources of disruption. These risk assessments are so indispensable to SCRM because they serve dual purposes. First, they help organizations identify and mitigate risk in their existing supply chains, pinpointing latent areas of concern with a high probability of triggering costly incidents. Second, they give businesses the intelligence and insights so critical to making informed decisions when choosing new suppliers and expanding their manufacturing networks. 

The best SCRM software available today provides users with comprehensive risk assessments for suppliers all over the world. Z2Data offers built-in risk scoring on more than 700,000 worldwide suppliers. These evaluations, which are continuously updated to reflect new information and developments within companies, analyze 12 unique risk factors to supply users with a holistic view of their vulnerabilities. Experienced teams assess companies based on factors like sourcing dependency, trade compliance, geopolitical risk, cybersecurity, and financials, among other critical facets of operations. Once Z2Data teams have gathered all the necessary information for all 12 risk categories, they carry out calculations based on a proprietary algorithm refined over nearly a decade. The result is risk scores that give companies a granular look into the relative resilience and internal operations of their existing and prospective suppliers. 

4. Real-Time Risk Monitoring (Informational)

It’s not enough for SCRM software to identify risk in a fixed fashion, though—these platforms need to be agile and able to respond to the fluidity and dynamism of today’s global supply chains. That’s why real-time risk monitoring is a critical capability for risk management platforms. With this feature, these tools can carry out rapid assessments of developing incidents and provide their users with intelligence delivered at a speed timely enough to be actionable. 

The most effective SCRM software will use large dragnets to surveil supply chains, including regularly monitoring major news publications, supplier websites, government agencies, and even social media to stay abreast of the latest incidents globally. Given how many different types of events can trigger supply chain disruptions, effective risk monitoring relies on internal taxonomies that may recognize dozens of different risk types—extreme weather events, labor strikes, factory shutdowns, power outages, and geopolitical conflict, among other incidents.

Some platforms take their risk monitoring capabilities a step further by offering customers disruption assessments tailored to their unique supply chains. Z2Data’s SCRM software maps events onto customer-specific suppliers, sites, and parts to produce customized impact analysis that shows users what supply chain variables are at the greatest risk. While not included in all risk management platforms, this functionality can be an essential resource for manufacturers, saving them the time, effort, and bandwidth required to carry out manual incident response campaigning without any roadmap. 

5. Sub-Tier Data Intelligence (Information & Operational)

Industries like automotive, electronics, and aerospace and defense have dense, intercontinental supply chains that run three, four, or even five tiers deep. For organizations operating in these sectors, mapping your direct suppliers may not provide sufficient risk mitigation. To really identify risk and understand the supply chain variables that pose the greatest threat to operational continuity, businesses need visibility into their sub-tiers. SCRM software with sub-tier intelligence can help customers glean critical insights into the supply chain relationships their manufacturing depends on, and places where those relationships are at the greatest risk. 

Z2Data’s supply chain risk management platform comes with some of the most comprehensive sub-tier intelligence in the industry. The tool is supported by an internal database of sub-tier relationships that can be immediately mapped onto customers’ supply chains, giving them advanced out-of-the-box coverage that accelerates their supply chain mapping process and reduces the time required to campaign manufacturers. With Z2Data’s sub-tier intelligence, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and other firms expand their data visibility, gain a deeper understanding of their supply chains, and bolster their risk management efforts. 

Z2Data Is the Most Comprehensive SCRM Software in 2025 

In 2025, it’s difficult to have an effective supply chain risk management program without being able to draw on SCRM software. These tools provide myriad features to identify risk and increase visibility, thereby providing an essential foundation for additional strategies and mitigation measures. Z2Data’s SCRM platform offers businesses an array of industry-leading capabilities:

• Risk monitoring with real-time impact analysis
• Proprietary risk assessments of 700,000 worldwide suppliers.
• Internal database of sub-tier supplier relationships
• BOM-level risk analysis
• Advanced customization options throughout the tool

In a global supply chain currently facing tariffs, geopolitical tensions, and significant export restrictions implemented by some of the world’s leading economies, there is a strategic imperative to strengthen supply chain risk management. One way to facilitate that is through SCRM software. 

To learn more about Z2Data and its comprehensive suite of SCRM features, sign up for a free trial.