What motivated you to build Bendi, and how did you identify the need for deeper supply chain visibility?
I was born in the Lualaba province of South Congo, a region where people are directly affected by what happens deep in global supply chains. So for me, the human cost of supply chain opacity has never been theoretical — it's personal.
When I met my co-founders, we all shared this urgency. Benjamin, our Chief Research Officer, brought insight from both the corporate and policymaking worlds, and Mandeep, our CEO, played a huge role in shaping Bendi’s direction — not just as a technology, but as a company built around this mission. His background in strategy and sustainability helped us translate a complex problem into something customers could act on.
We started with textile companies, where the risks were most visible, and now we’re working across sectors like advanced manufacturing. What’s remained consistent is how closely we work with our users — listening, iterating, and making sure Bendi delivers real clarity in a space that’s full of noise.
Your platform helps detect risks like deforestation, labour violations, and unethical governance. How does Prism actually work behind the scenes?
Prism gathers signals from a wide range of sources — from customs data and satellite imagery to NGO reports, local media, and even leaks or forecast models. Under the hood, we use a combination of entity resolution, anomaly detection, and NLP to stitch fragmented data into a coherent picture — across languages, timeframes, and jurisdictions.
What makes Prism powerful is the combination of purpose-built AI and human oversight. It’s not just about automation — we have humans in the loop at every stage to handle messy, incomplete, or misleading supplier data. That blend of intelligence helps us detect real risks that others miss — and do it in hours, not months.
Why do you think traditional supply chain risk management is no longer enough for large retailers and brands?
The reality is, traditional approaches weren’t built for the complexity of today’s supply chains — or the speed at which risks now emerge. Audits are infrequent, suppliers can opt out of disclosure, and internal systems are often siloed. Even the most diligent teams rarely get a holistic view.
At the same time, the stakes have changed. You’ve got regulation with real teeth, consumer expectations for transparency, and investors who are now asking hard ESG questions. And then there’s operational pressure: goods worth billions are being held at borders or flagged due to hidden risks. Companies need to act smarter, faster — and with full context.
What kind of impact (financial, operational, or reputational) have your customers seen after adopting Bendi?
We've seen companies reduce incident resolution time significantly and gain cost efficiencies by consolidating risk workflows into one platform. One customer changed their supplier vetting process after Prism flagged Tier-N risks they hadn’t previously seen — and ended up terminating multiple relationships.
More surprisingly, several brands told us that Bendi helped them have better conversations with suppliers. When you show up with facts — not assumptions — the dynamic shifts. One client called it “transparency as a bridge” rather than a threat. That’s a kind of ROI that shows up across teams, not just in line items.
How does Bendi help companies reduce their climate and social impact beyond just compliance?
Compliance is the floor — our customers want to go further. Bendi helps them make sourcing decisions that align with their values, whether that’s avoiding deforestation, lowering emissions, or engaging more meaningfully with Tier 2 suppliers. One of our clients has strict internal ESG rules, and they’ve used our data to draw much clearer red lines and take proactive action.
We’re also developing tools for scenario modelling and impact forecasting, so companies can simulate trade-offs before making big changes. It’s about giving sustainability teams the same level of strategic insight that finance or ops teams already have.
What’s next for Bendi? Are there new features or strategic directions you're especially excited about?
We’re expanding globally — especially in Europe and Asia — and pushing deeper into sectors like finance, where ESG risk in third-party networks is only just being understood. On the tech side, we're investing heavily in predictive modelling and context-building tools to help teams not just react, but anticipate what’s coming.
And we’re watching the regulatory landscape closely. We want our customers to be two steps ahead — not scrambling to catch up. Ultimately, we believe supply chains can become a force for good. But it starts with knowing what’s really going on.
