Caddy's AI Supply Chain Platform

Summary

The meeting featured Yoshiro Kato, Co-founder and CEO of Caddy, who discussed Caddy’s recent $38M funding round and their AI-powered data platform for manufacturing companies.
Key topics included how Caddy’s platform helps streamline workflows, optimize supply chains, and the impact of global tariff uncertainty on supply chain decisions.
Kato outlined Caddy’s international expansion plans and current market trends affecting the manufacturing sector.

Caddy is an AI-powered data platform tailored for manufacturing companies, focusing on transforming siloed engineering and supply chain data into valuable organizational assets.
The platform automatically aggregates data from multiple systems, extracts and analyzes data from engineering drawings, and recognizes part shapes to identify similar components within an organization.
This functionality allows procurement officers to find historical suppliers for similar parts, reduce costs, and minimize part duplication within engineering and procurement processes.

Caddy’s platform assists companies in navigating tariff challenges and relocating supply chains, especially for those diversifying away from China to the US or North America.
The solution increases supply chain visibility, helping organizations identify which suppliers they have used and which parts have been sourced globally.
Customers are increasingly focused on supplier identification, cost reduction, and minimizing uncertainty amid ongoing market disruptions.

Caddy has been in operation since 2017, experiencing several supply chain disruptions, including those during COVID-19 and previous tariff disputes.
The company has four offices globally: Japan, the US, and two in Southeast Asia, with plans to expand into Europe and other regions of Asia due to growing demand.
US-based manufacturing companies’ demand is rising, partly due to ongoing tariff uncertainty and the need for supply chain resilience and localization.