DHL TradeConnect Summit 2026
Turning Customs Management into your Supply Chain Advantage
Shaping the Future of Customs Management
Join us in Chicago for an executive‑level discussion on how customs management has become a decisive factor in supply‑chain performance. The DHL TradeConnect Summit brings together senior leaders to exchange perspectives, explore real‑world use cases, and experience how DHL TradeConnect helps transform customs from a compliance burden into a measurable business advantage.
What Are the Benefits for You?
- Connect with peer leaders across supply chain, trade, and operations:
Engage with senior executives facing similar challenges around speed, scalability, and reliability in an increasingly complex U.S. and global trade environment. - Understand what’s changing in U.S. and global customs environments:
Gain insights into regulatory shifts, enforcement trends, and digital advances shaping customs management today and what this means for supply chain executives. - Explore how customs management directly impacts supply chain performance:
Examine where delays, inconsistencies, and data gaps erode performance and how a more holistic approach can create consistency, speed, and control. - Experience how DHL TradeConnect enables smarter customs management:
See how the digital solution supports data driven decision making, proactive risk management, and performance monitoring without necessarily requiring deep customs expertise.
Event Outline
| 09:00-09:30 | Registration & breakfast |
| 09:30-12:00 | Interactive Executive Workshop/break-outs A hands‑on session focused on identifying where customs impacts supply‑chain performance and how leading organizations are addressing these challenges. |
| 12:30-14:00 | Networking Lunch & Demos |
| 14:00-14:15 | Opening and introduction |
| 14:15-14:45 | Keynote A forward‑looking perspective on how trade, technology, and regulation are redefining supply‑chain competitiveness. |
| 14:45-15:15 | Solution update: The DHL TradeConnect Journey in a Dynamic U.S. Environment An update on where DHL TradeConnect started, what has evolved, and how customers are using it today to improve transparency, predictability, and performance. |
| 15:15-15:30 | Coffee break |
| 15:30-16:15 | Panel discussion/Round table: How Executives Turn Customs Management into Performance Results A practitioner‑led discussion on what works, what doesn’t, and where customs management creates tangible value across complex supply chains. |
| 16:15-16:45 | Fireside Chat |
| 16:45-17:00 | Closing remarks |
| 17:00-18:00 | Networking cocktails |
Speakers
Senior Leaders and Experts in Customs and Supply Chain
Greg Nichols - SVP Customs Solutions, DHL Global Forwarding
Greg is a global logistics and customs executive leading DHL’s Customs Solutions business, with a focus on advancing data‑driven trade management and helping multinational companies optimize cross‑border supply chain performance.
Pete Mento - Director Global Trade Advisory, Baker Tilly
Pete is a global trade and customs advisor specializing in international trade policy, tariffs, customs valuation, and supply chain strategy. Pete serves as a senior advisor at Baker Tilly and is a Board Member and the Customs Chair the International Trade Council.
tba - Senior Representative, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
(tbc in due course)
Evan Pressman - Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Ergo
Evan leads the Flashpoints Forum, a geopolitical and economic forecasting community advising senior business and government leaders on global risks and disruptions. He previously helped build the geopolitical risk division at Gerson Lehrman Group and worked as a journalist at CNN covering the September 11 attacks. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the NationSwell Council, and a Truman National Security Fellow.
Daniel Oestericher - Director, US Policy Forecasting & Analysis, Ergo
Daniel is a Director on the Flashpoints Forum team, leading forecasting initiatives. His work centres on trade, tax, industrial policy, and economic statecraft. Previously he worked for the US State Department in Istanbul, the Peres Center for Peace in Tel Aviv, and The Reckoning Project in Madrid, focusing on transnational legal issues and conflict documentation. 
Turn complexity into control, and control into advantage
In an environment defined by volatility and increasing regulation, the organizations that win will be those that manage customs proactively, not reactively.
Join us in Chicago to explore how leading companies are doing exactly that and how DHL TradeConnect enables a more predictable, data-driven, and performance-focused approach to customs.
Because when customs is part of your strategy, your entire supply chain performs better.