This analysis deconstructs five retail assortment vendors, RELEX Solutions, Aptean, SymphonyAI, o9 Solutions, and First Insight along an in-depth, specific lens: suitability for business scale (SMB, large, and enterprise-level retailers). Rather than critiquing breadth of features, here we prioritize the reality of implementation: who really gets the job done for whom?

As in retail today, it is not about having the most features. It is about who can get it done with the accuracy, in the volume, and in the process, not sacrificing the business.

RELEX Solutions: Built for High-Velocity, High-Volume Enterprise Retail

RELEX Solutions has built a robust market share among large and enterprise retail, including grocery, discount, and speciality forms. Its unified planning platform is built for scale, with native support for space-aware assortment, rule-based and replenishment-integrated logic, and core support for dealing with thousands of SKUs in diverse banners and territories. Furthermore, the company have builds for complexity upfront with its single planning-execution architecture, ensures that its decision about the right assortment stays connected with store capacity, availability, and localization parameters regardless of size of the footprint. Enterprise clients consistently mention reduced planning effort, enhanced availability, and better response to seasonal patterns.

Aptean: Mid-Market Discipline, Enterprise Momentum

Aptean has addressed the mid-market in vertically aligned solutions in the areas of food & beverage, apparel, and general merchandise. In assortment planning, however, it is now showing upward momentum. With industry-specific, user-driven workflows, and modular adoption pathways, Aptean fills the function gap for expanding retailers who find planning in native ERP inadequate. The power behind it is its industry specificity appreciating that diversity in speciality food chains is different from that in home furnishings or healthcare retailers. For volatile business buyers hesitant about costly transformation initiatives, Aptean provides an alternative with better ROI realization.

SymphonyAI: Smart Core, Gaining Ground in Enterprise Readiness

SymphonyAI offers a robust AI-powered retail planning suite, with growing traction among upper mid-market and large retailers. Its core strength lies in intelligent assortment planning, driven by modules that incorporate store clustering, space-aware modeling, and consumer need-state segmentation. These capabilities support a more localized and customer-centric planning process, particularly valuable for retailers navigating SKU complexity across diverse geographies and channels. However, from an enterprise readiness standpoint, SymphonyAI remains in transition. While its assortment and merchandising tools are well-integrated internally, cross-functional orchestration particularly with supply chain, promotions, and financial planning systems is not yet fully mature. The lack of native promotional integration limits the platform’s end-to-end decisioning ability, to stitch together connected workflows.

o9 solutions: Great Architecture, Evolving Assortment Capabilities

o9 Solutions offers a scalable, AI-powered digital-planning platform that integrates merchandising, supply chain, and financial planning into a unified environment. The platform supports advanced workflows, like scenario planning and real-time performance analysis, enabling retailers to orchestrate assortment decisions within an enterprise wide. While certain functions such as space-aware logic, visual merchandising, and store-level planning require tailored development, this configurability allows enterprise retailers to build customized planning environments aligned with their specific merchandising models. The platform is well suited for organizations that view assortment as an integrated part of a larger planning transformation.

First Insight: SMB-to-Mid Market Innovation, Not Yet Enterprise-Grade

First Insight is focused on product-level decision optimization leveraging consumer-driven analytics to support assortment validation, product curation, and pricing simulation. The platform is well-suited for small and mid-sized retailers in fashion, sporting goods, or DTC sectors where subjective merchandising still dominates. However, the platform isn’t designed for enterprise-scale complexity, such as automated SKU localization, planogram integration, or cross-region assortment alignment. It excels as a decision-support layer, not a full-stack assortment platform. First Insight delivers high value in the early stages of retail maturity. It’s not built for enterprise planning complexity, but it was never meant to be.

Final Perspective: Industry Size Matters, But Most Vendors Pretend It Doesn’t

In retail assortment planning, the challenge isn’t just scale it’s alignment. The most effective platforms are those that match the retailer’s operational maturity, not just their size. RELEX and Aptean stand out for embedding execution logic that reflects real-world retail complexity, while SymphonyAI and First Insight deliver targeted value within narrower scopes o9 Solutions, with its expansive enterprise planning architecture, brings strong integration potential across financial, supply chain, and merchandising domains. Its assortment capabilities are evolving, and the platform’s flexibility can be a strength, especially for retailers with the internal governance to tailor workflows. As assortment becomes more central to competitive differentiation, retailers must choose systems not for their theoretical scalability, but for their proven ability to deliver precision, speed, and control where it matters most.

Disclaimer:

This blog is based on independent research and publicly available information. The insights presented reflect the views of QKS Group and are for informational purposes only. While we strive for accuracy, we do not guarantee completeness or absolute correctness. Vendors are welcome to provide clarifications or updates. If any vendor listed in this analysis wishes to provide additional context or clarification, we welcome a briefing call and will consider incorporating relevant updates. This analysis is not intended to disparage any vendor but to provide an informed, balanced perspective. We encourage open and constructive dialogue to foster transparency and a deeper understanding of the industry.

Authors: Prakhar Bansal, Analystat QKS Group

Kumar Anand, Associate Director & Principal Industry Analyst at QKS Group