Geopolitical uncertainty is no longer an exceptional event that companies can manage with a temporary stock buffer. A new European Investment Bank and European Commission study finds that almost two-thirds of EU firms consider themselves prepared for geopolitical risks—but preparedness among small and medium-sized enterprises is below 50%. For Slovak SMEs, the practical question is not whether to duplicate every supplier. It is where one interruption could stop delivery, erode margin or leave the company without a credible answer to its customer.
The risk has also changed shape. In the EIB study, reported obstacles related to raw materials, semiconductors and logistics fell between 2023 and 2025, while regulatory compliance and tariff concerns rose. This means that a shipment can be physically available and still become late, uneconomic or unusable because its origin, documentation, classification or commercial terms no longer fit.
Slovakia's position makes this especially relevant. Eurostat reports that 78.3% of Slovak trade in goods in 2025 was intra-EU, one of the highest shares in the Union. The Slovak Statistical Office recorded goods exports of €110.9 billion in 2025. The Single Market is therefore a major stabilising environment, but concentrated customers, suppliers, components or routes can still create company-level vulnerability.
Start with the customer promise
Supplier analysis often begins with purchasing volume. That can hide the real exposure. A low-cost component may stop a high-value product, while an expensive material may be easily replaced. Start instead with the products and services that matter most to revenue, strategic customers or contractual commitments.
For each priority offer, write down the promise the company must protect: delivery date, approved specification, service continuity, minimum capacity or response time. Then trace backwards through the processes, materials, software, transport and external services needed to keep that promise. This creates a business map rather than a procurement list.
Find the points with no practical substitute
A dependency becomes critical when impact is high and the time to recover is longer than the time the business can tolerate. Assess four questions:
- Impact: what revenue, customer, production step or compliance requirement is affected?
- Time: after how many hours, days or weeks does the interruption become material?
- Replaceability: is an alternative technically, contractually and operationally usable—not merely listed?
- Visibility: would the company receive an early signal, or discover the problem only when delivery fails?
Do not stop at the direct supplier. A reliable tier-one partner can depend on one sub-supplier, one production region or one specialised logistics route. SMEs rarely have complete multi-tier data, but they can ask focused questions about the few components that would genuinely stop operations.
Separate four types of exposure
Combining every concern under “supplier risk” produces vague actions. Separate at least four forms of exposure:
- Supply exposure: capacity loss, quality failure, long lead time or sole-source material.
- Trade exposure: tariffs, customs procedures, origin rules, sanctions or changing documentation.
- Commercial exposure: currency, price escalation, minimum order quantities or financially weak partners.
- Operational exposure: missing specifications, tools, data, approvals or internal knowledge needed to switch.
The distinction determines the response. Additional inventory can bridge a short logistics delay, but it does not solve an unusable certificate. A new supplier does not help if the company needs six months to validate the part. A contractual price clause may protect margin, but not delivery capacity.
Build options in the right order
Start with inexpensive options that reduce decision time. Confirm current lead times, maintain complete specifications, record approved equivalents and identify who can authorise a substitution. Agree which customer changes require consent. Keep supplier, customs and technical contacts current.
Then test operational alternatives. A name in a spreadsheet is not a second source. Request a sample, verify capacity, review quality evidence and run a limited order where justified. For services and software, test data export, access rights, recovery procedures and the practical effort of moving.
Use inventory selectively. Define what event the buffer covers and how much time it buys. Stocking twelve months of a component that may become obsolete can create a different risk. A smaller buffer combined with a tested substitute and an earlier warning may be more resilient.
Use the Single Market, but avoid hidden concentration
The EIB report identifies the EU Single Market as a buffer: firms trading only within the EU reduced emergency supply-chain adjustments more sharply than those with broader exposure. For Slovak companies, sourcing or selling within the Union can reduce some customs and regulatory friction. It does not automatically diversify risk.
Two suppliers in different countries may use the same upstream producer. Several routes may depend on the same border crossing, warehouse or carrier. A customer portfolio spread across EU countries may still be concentrated in one industry or corporate group. Map common dependencies, not just different names and addresses.
Define triggers before the disruption
A resilience plan should state when management changes course. Useful triggers can include a lead-time increase beyond an agreed threshold, repeated quality deviations, loss of a required certificate, a tariff change that removes the expected margin, a deteriorating supplier payment profile or a customer's revised forecast.
Each trigger needs an owner and a pre-agreed decision: increase monitoring, place a limited safety order, qualify an alternative, renegotiate terms or inform affected customers. This preserves speed without giving one person unlimited authority. It also prevents every negative headline from causing an expensive reaction.
Run a short scenario exercise
Choose one credible scenario: a critical component is delayed for six weeks; a tariff changes landed cost; a supplier can deliver only half the planned volume; or documentation makes a shipment unusable. Ask the team to work through the first 48 hours and the following four weeks.
The exercise should expose missing information and decisions, not produce theatre. Can the company identify affected orders? Who contacts the supplier and the customer? Which substitute has actually been approved? What cash-flow effect follows? Which commitments can be protected and which need renegotiation?
A practical 30-day resilience sprint
- Prioritise: select the customer promises and offers whose interruption would matter most.
- Trace: map the external and internal dependencies behind them.
- Score: estimate impact, time-to-impact, replaceability and warning quality.
- Prepare: complete specifications, contacts, decision rights and customer communication rules.
- Test: validate one alternative or run one scenario for the highest exposure.
- Review: assign the next action and a date, rather than leaving a static risk register.
The result is not immunity from disruption. It is a company that knows which risks deserve money, which deserve information and which can be accepted. That is more useful than either permanent firefighting or an expensive attempt to eliminate every uncertainty.
For support in structuring dependencies, scenarios and proportionate business responses, see our Consulting services.
Sources and further reading
Facts, figures and current context were checked against the following official European and Slovak sources on 27 September 2026. The dependency map, assessment model, sprint, practical recommendations, conclusions and wording are original editorial work by Merkle s. r. o.
- European Commission: EU businesses redesign supply chains as geopolitical risks become the new normal
- European Investment Bank: Redesigning supply chains—EU firms in a time of geopolitical risk
- Eurostat: Intra-EU trade in goods—main features
- Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic: Foreign trade—definitive results in 2025
This article provides general business information. Trade, customs, sanctions, contractual and regulatory questions must be verified for the relevant goods, countries and circumstances; the article does not replace individual legal, customs or tax advice.