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Supply Chain by the Numbers

May 8, 2026

Supply Chain by the Numbers for May 8, 2026

Amazon Sends Shot across the Bow of the Logistics Sector. Cargo Theft Soared in 2025. Gartner on GenAI Project Fails. US PMI Shows Manufacturing Expansion again in April


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10%
That’s much the share price of both UPS and FedEx fell Monday on the news that Amazon was opening up its vast logistics network to virtually any company, not just for its own needs and those of its Marketplace sellers, as is largely the case today. The new Supply Chain Services unit appears to be a centralized place for companies from consumer-goods manufacturers to apparel retailers to hire Amazon for services such as fulfillment, ocean and air shipping, and truck transportation. Well-known Morgan Stanley parcel sector analyst Ravi Shanker had this to say about the move in a research note, according to Bloomberg: “ASCS could be a watershed moment for North American freight transportation companies. Air freight companies and parcel carriers are likely to take the hardest hit, while truckers, railroads, ocean shippers and warehouse operators are also at risk, Shanker wrote.

That is now the number of consecutive months the Purchasing Managers Index from the Institute for Supply Management has been above the key 50 mark that separates US manufacturing expansion from contraction, with the numbers for April released by ISM last Friday. With a score of 52.7 in April, was the same level seen in March. The New Orders Index also expanded for the fourth straight month after four straight readings in contraction, registering 54.1, up 0.6 percentage point compared to the March figure of 53.5, and still above the key 50 mark, in good news for future US manufacturing activity.



$725 Million+
That was the value of cargo thefts in the US and Canada in 2025, marking a 60% year over year increase, with incidents up 18% and average losses per theft rising to $273,990. Published last week, FBI alert says attackers gain unauthorized access to logistics systems through phishing and spoofed communications, then post fraudulent loads or manipulate legitimate shipments. This cyber-enabled strategic cargo theft is surging, as threat actors increasingly impersonate legitimate brokers and carriers to hijack freight and reroute high-value shipments for resale. The cyber actors pose as victim companies and post fraudulent listings on load boards1 to deceive shippers, brokers, and carriers into handing over goods, which are redirected from their intended destination and stolen for resale.

50+%

TThat’s the failure rate in companies relative to so-called GenAI projects. That according to the research firm Gartner and analyst Arun Chandrasekaran in a blog post earlier this year that we reported on this week. Gartner said its metric tracked AI projects that were abandoned after proof of concept due to poor data quality, inadequate risk controls, escalating costs or unclear business value. “Organizations racing to implement GenAI find themselves caught between the pressure to innovate and the reality of what it takes to actually do so,” wrote Chandrasekaran. However, the biggest obstacle for companies isn’t the technology itself — it’s how organizations approach implementation, Gartner believes.

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