In just the past week, a storm has been building that no American B2B business can ignore. On May 6th, sweeping new tariffs were announced, described by some media outlets as “a COVID-level event” for importers and exporters alike.
At the same time, regional conflict in the Red Sea has again thrown global shipping into chaos. US companies are scrambling to avoid shipping delays and tariffs altogether —rerouting suppliers, shifting contracts, and swallowing new logistics costs with each pivot.
This is more than a news cycle. It’s a business-critical inflection point.
For small to medium-sized B2B businesses, these global shocks have real, immediate impact, including:
- Margin compressions
- Delayed shipments
- Renegotiated contracts
- Inventory shortages Loss of competitive advantage to faster-moving players
Even Ford, one of the most iconic manufacturers in the world, revealed in a NYT article that its earnings are under pressure due to tariff turbulence and global uncertainty. If Ford is struggling to manage this, what chance does the mid-sized distributor or manufacturer have? More so, those still managing pricing and inventory with spreadsheets or legacy BI systems?
A cursory glance in the news can confirm the ripple effect: price increases, product shortages, and port congestion are already impacting operations across the country. The message is clear: in a turbulent economy, the ability to move quickly, guided by real-time insights, is not optional. It’s a competitive mandate.
What B2B Companies Are Facing Right Now
In 2025, the pressures facing B2B organizations are sharper than ever—and the numbers prove it. According to Freightos, the cost to ship a 40-foot container from China to the US West Coast has skyrocketed from $1,400 in late 2023 to over $4,200—a 200%+ spike that’s hammering importers and eating into margins.
Even worse? That premium doesn’t buy predictability. Average transit times have ballooned from pre-pandemic norms of 28 days to more than 40, straining just-in-time inventory strategies and eroding customer satisfaction.
Logistics Management highlights just how volatile the situation has become, with rate swings driven by instability in the Middle East, fuel price surges, and port congestion. And businesses hoping to de-risk by sourcing from Latin America or Mexico are learning the hard way that capacity is tight and infrastructure is lagging. More Than Shipping notes that increasing demand on these alternative routes is already creating new chokepoints.
Meanwhile, sourcing shifts introduce another layer of complexity: regulatory compliance. Companies that never had to worry about Harmonized Tariff Schedule (HTS) codes or USMCA origin rules are now grappling with documentation, qualification checks, and classification audits—often with little internal expertise to guide them.
The result? Margin erosion, compliance risk, longer lead times, and a reactive posture in the marketplace.
When Data Silos and Manual Processes Make It Worse
Unfortunately, many B2B companies still operate in disconnected silos where procurement, sales, compliance, and logistics use different tools and timelines. This leads to price mismatches, inaccurate demand forecasts, and costly delays.
Instead of agility, there’s lag. Instead of confident decisions, there’s second-guessing. And instead of acting on real-time signals, teams are left responding to outdated reports.
This is where many organizations lose ground, not because they lack the will, but because they lack the infrastructure.
AAXIS + Palantir: Your Real-Time Operating System
AAXIS is helping B2B businesses shift from reactive to proactive by deploying a real-time business operating system built on Palantir Foundry and AIP. This isn’t just data consolidation. It’s about activating the data you already have, wherever it lives, and using it to power real-time decisions across sourcing, pricing, compliance, and logistics.
With Palantir, our clients can:
- Simulate Tariff Scenarios: Analyze tariff exposure across SKUs, suppliers, and regions in seconds.
- Protect Margins: Adjust pricing in real time based on landed cost, freight volatility, and contract terms.
- Automate Compliance: Validate HTS codes and USMCA rules-of-origin without guesswork or manual audits.
- Streamline Decision-Making: Empower teams with AI-recommended actions based on live supply and demand conditions.
These aren’t future capabilities. They’re happening today with measurable impact on margin retention, customer satisfaction, and operational speed.
Your Data Is Not Too Messy to Start
A common misconception is that a system this powerful requires perfect data. It doesn’t.
The AAXIS approach is iterative. We help you start with what you have, and then use every insight, every transaction, every decision to continuously improve your data quality and governance over time. It’s not about building a clean data warehouse before you act. It’s about acting now, with the tools to get smarter every step of the way.
From Periodic Reports to Hourly Signals
In today’s market, weekly or monthly freight reports and quarterly tariff reviews are simply too slow. Businesses need alerts, not summaries. They need forecasts that adapt in real time, not static spreadsheets based on assumptions that expired yesterday.
Without this level of intelligence, companies risk repeating the same mistakes: slow pivots, poor forecasts, and margin leakage. With it, they make faster, smarter decisions that protect their profitability, serve their customers better, and position them to outpace competitors.
Let’s Build Your Competitive Edge
You don’t need to be the biggest player to win in today’s market. You need to be the fastest to act, the smartest in your response, and the most connected when it counts.
That’s what Palantir and AAXIS deliver: real-time intelligence, connected decisions, and a faster feedback loop between risk and response.
Let us show you how it works. Contact us to see how you can transform global disruption into your next advantage.
