Covetrus goes live on RELEX forecasting across its distribution centers

Covetrus has gone live on RELEX Solutions' forecasting and replenishment software across its 28 distribution centers, the software vendor said in an October 6th, 2026 release. The release gives no results and does not say when the rollout began or ended. It landed the same day MLex reported that Covetrus and MWI had offered remedies to regulators reviewing their merger.

What a clinic sees is a delivery box. What decides whether the right box arrives is a demand forecast.

Covetrus puts forecasting software across its warehouses

RELEX says Covetrus has gone live on its forecasting and replenishment tools across the distribution network. The release puts that network at 28 distribution centers and more than 10,000 SKUs, both company-reported figures we could not check elsewhere, and the release does not say what the SKU count covers. Demandtex supported the implementation.

The release frames the move as a response to a growing network. John Simonovich, Covetrus's vice president of strategic sourcing and procurement, said the company chose RELEX for "their proven expertise in wholesale pharmacy". He also cited RELEX's ability to support "transitions from legacy systems," but the release does not name the system being replaced. RELEX, which reports more than 600 customers worldwide, says its platform can reduce days of supply while maintaining service levels.

Merger review makes distribution reliability a live question

Covetrus has also agreed to merge with Cencora's MWI Animal Health in a deal that values MWI at a $3.5B enterprise value, announced in February. In our coverage of the FTC's deeper review, we argued that fewer national distributors would mean less backup when a supplier runs short.

Under the agreed terms, Cencora receives $1.25B in cash, $800M in preferred equity and $1.45B in common equity, a 34.3% non-controlling common equity stake in the combined company. The February release gave no closing date and said completion is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals. Cencora's guidance at the time did not assume a close in its fiscal year ended September 30th, 2026.

Cencora's latest quarterly filing puts numbers on the MWI side. It lists $872.3M of inventory inside the MWI business held for sale at June 30th, 2026, which is MWI's stock and not the Covetrus network the new software covers. The same filing says Cencora received a request for additional information from the FTC on May 20th, 2026, and continues to work cooperatively with staff on the review.

MLex reported on October 6th, 2026 that Covetrus and MWI had submitted a remedy proposal to regulators, including the FTC and about a dozen states, and that the offer was understood not to have satisfied them.

If we had to guess, a distributor under antitrust review has every reason to show that service holds up at scale. The release does not link the rollout to the merger.

Covetrus also serves independents through its VetSuite program, which passed 4,000 member practices in May. In our view, first-time fill rates are what those practices will notice.

The proof will be fill rates, not features

The release offers no results. It gives no fill rate, inventory turn or days-of-supply figure from Covetrus, no contract value or timeline, and only RELEX's general claims about its own tools.

Patterson, a rival distributor, launched the Atlas assistant inside its NaVetor practice software in September. Covetrus is investing in its warehouses.

Clinics can ask their rep for fill-rate and backorder data at the next contract review.

Until Covetrus shares that data, this is an investment, not a result.

Source: RELEX Solutions via PR Newswire