STE Webinar: IBM Sterling OMS Peak readiness 2026 - 'SIP and GIV - Best Practices and Recommendations'

Content

Webinar Session Details:
          Title: STE Webinar: IBM Sterling OMS Peak readiness 2026 - 'SIP and GIV - Best Practices and Recommendations'
          Schedule: Thursday, August 27th, 2026, 10:00 AM - 11:00 AM Eastern Time (US & Canada)
 

Session Speakers:
Shoeb Bihari - Executive IT Specialist | SRE Architect | SWAT, IBM Sterling OMS Support
Jelena Markovic - Advisory Support Engineer, IBM Sterling OMS Support
Damini Tacouri - Advisory Support Engineer, IBM Sterling OMS Support
Tonima Mukherjee - Client Engagement Manager, IBM Sterling OMS Support
Madhavi Pilaka - Technical Support Engineer, IBM Sterling OMS Support
Cathrin Christo Sagayarajan - Technical Support Engineer, IBM Sterling OMS Support
Jitendra Buge - Technical Lead, IBM Sterling OMS Support
 

Questions & Answer:

Question #1: Which SIP container version features are illustrated in this slide#7 of presentation?
Answer: The features highlighted in the presentation are not associated with a single SIP Container release. They represent capabilities introduced across multiple recent releases. Customers running a current supported release of Sterling Intelligent Promising (SIP) should have access to these capabilities, subject to their environment configuration and entitlement. For a complete list of new features and enhancements, refer to the IBM documentation: What's New in Sterling Intelligent Promising

Question #2: How can inventory reconciliation be performed with Sterling Intelligent Promising?
Answer: Inventory reconciliation is typically performed by comparing inventory data maintained in Sterling Intelligent Promising with inventory data from external systems, such as ERP, commerce, or warehouse management systems. Sterling Intelligent Promising serves as the inventory source of truth for inventory operations within the platform. To support reconciliation activities, inventory data can be extracted using supply events and compared against corresponding records from external systems. One commonly used approach is to generate supply snapshot events for the relevant nodes and extract inventory attributes such as Item ID, Unit of Measure (UOM), Point of Control (POC), Supply Type, Node, and Quantity. This data can then be compared against inventory records maintained in external systems. Customers are encouraged to consume inventory events and integrate them into their reconciliation processes. If inventory discrepancies are identified, updates can be applied through the supported inventory and supply APIs.

Question #3: Do I need to use HOT SKU when using Sterling Intelligent Promising for inventory management?
Answer: No. HOT SKU functionality is not required when inventory management is handled through Sterling Intelligent Promising (SIP).
HOT SKU is a legacy Sterling Order Management capability designed to reduce database lock contention during high-volume inventory availability requests.
Sterling Intelligent Promising uses a architecture that is event-driven, cache-backed, and designed to support high concurrency without relying on the database locking mechanisms used by traditional inventory implementations. As a result, HOT SKU functionality is not utilized within SIP inventory processing.
For customers using traditional Global Inventory Visibility (GIV) implementations, additional information on HOT SKU tuning is available in the following resources:
• HOT SKU Performance Tuning
• Sterling Order Management Performance Guide

Question #4: For the case study presented on Slide #11, How does SIP address concurrent inventory requests and prevent over-promising?
Answer: In environments that use User Exits (UEs) to provide supply information, overselling can occur if the returned supply is not recognized as inventory that requires reservation management. To address this scenario, support was introduced for the IsInternalSupply attribute in the User Exit response.
When a supply record is returned with IsInternalSupply="Y", IBM Sterling Order Management recognizes the supply as internally managed inventory and initiates the appropriate Inventory Visibility (IV) reservation process during scheduling. This allows temporary reservations to be created while orders are being scheduled, helping to prevent multiple concurrent requests from allocating the same inventory. By ensuring temporary reservations are created during scheduling, the solution helps reduce the risk of over-promising and overselling in high-concurrency environments.

Question #5: What is the HOT SKU feature?
Answer: HOT SKU is a IBM Sterling Order Management feature designed to reduce inventory lock contention for high-demand items that experience significant transaction volume. The feature was developed for traditional inventory implementations where multiple transactions could compete for access to the same inventory records, resulting in database locking and reduced throughput. Additional details about HOT SKU are available in IBM Documentation: HOT SKU Performance Feature

Question #6: Is there an API available to retrieve all safety stock rules configured through Order Hub?
Answer: Yes. IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising provides APIs that can be used to retrieve safety stock rule definitions configured through Order Hub.
For node-level safety stock rules, refer to: Node Rules API
For network-level safety stock rules, refer to: Network Rules API
These APIs enable customers to query and manage safety stock rule configurations maintained within IBM Sterling Inventory Visibility and Order Hub.

Question #7: Does IBM Sterling OMS track fast-selling items? If so, how?
Answer: Yes. IBM Sterling Order Management can identify and track fast-selling items through the HOT SKU feature.
The HOT SKU feature monitors demand patterns for individual items by evaluating the volume of requests received for a SKU within a defined time interval. This helps identify items experiencing unusually high transaction activity.
Additionally, Real-Time Availability Monitor (RTAM) can provide visibility into inventory activity and availability levels across nodes. RTAM activity based mode can help identify fast-selling items when inventory availability falls below configured thresholds, enabling proactive inventory management.
For more information about the HOT SKU feature, refer to:
• HOT SKU Performance Feature

Question #8: Are the enhancements and fixes discussed in this session applicable to the standard IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising (SIP) offering?
Answer: Yes. The enhancements and fixes discussed during this session are applicable to the standard IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising (SIP) offering unless otherwise specified in the related documentation or release notes. Customers should review the applicable release documentation to confirm availability and any version-specific prerequisites.

Question #9: Can the SIP monitoring dashboard include Optimizer and Rank Node API metrics along with other SIP API metrics?
Answer: Support for displaying Optimizer and Rank Node API metrics within the SIP monitoring dashboard is not currently available as part of the discussed functionality. Future availability is subject to product roadmap decisions and release planning. Customers interested in this capability are encouraged to submit enhancement requests through https://watsonsupplychain.ideas.ibm.com/

Note: The responses above are based on the limited information gathered from our brief discussion during the STE Session. Please validate and test all recommendations in a lower environment, to ensure it meets your business requirement, before implementing them in Production.
If you need further assistance, a deeper analysis, or have additional questions, please raise a support case with additional context along-with business use-case, and we will be happy to help with more insights, accordingly. Thank you!