Category Archives: Technology

Mexico’s New E-Invoicing Requirements: Invoiceware’s Solution Elements

Jason Busch - June 17, 2013 6:39 AM | Categories: Technology

shipping Jason Busch concludes his interview with Invoiceware International with a glimpse into what their software can do for companies who must comply with Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, and Chile's e-invoicing standards. A preview: they go deep into the applications, as ERP systems were not designed for this type of business process or change, especially on a localized level.

[More...]
 

Ariba News: Product Rationalization, Integration, and Spend Visibility Hot ‘Rodding

Jason Busch - May 14, 2013 9:01 AM | Categories: Technology

speed At Ariba LIVE last week, Ariba shared the latest about its joint efforts with SAP in spend analysis. We previously covered some of the platform consolidation announcements that occurred on Spend Matters PRO – here’s a snippet (with full links to PRO coverage at the end of this story): “It is important to understand exactly how quickly the organization has moved to rationalize specific product areas. In less than two quarters since closing the acquisition, SAP has made the following decisions (our analysis of these actions and comparative product capabilities will follow in a forthcoming PRO research and webinar series): [...]

[More...]
 

Ariba News: Network, Discovery, and Spot Buy Integration

Jason Busch - May 13, 2013 6:06 AM | Categories: Technology

Over the past few months, Ariba (and SAP) have actively shared a number of procurement technology and infrastructure roadmap elements with clients, prospects, and partners. This includes focusing on, among other areas, the continued delivery and development on many (but not all) common products, platforms and application environments (e.g., cloud vs. on-premise) between the two companies. At LIVE last week, Ariba shared several specific areas of investment and development in the their network and application offerings, including leveraging SAP’s in-memory database, HANA, to power its own spend analytics application. Many other announcements surrounding LIVE represent incremental improvements leveraging existing Ariba [...]

[More...]
 

Our Evaluation Process: An Optimal RFP For E-Sourcing Solutions

Thomas Kase - May 9, 2013 3:03 PM | Categories: Technology

We recently reached out to sourcing solution software providers with a round of questions to understand how they position themselves in the marketplace: how do they deliver value to clients, where are their differentiators, etc. – so we can deliver the highest quality shortlists possible to readers like you. Today we’re offering an insider’s look into our internal sausage-making process in the spirit of full transparency  for our PRO audience – sharing the RFP spreadsheet we sent to the solution providers a few months ago. Become a  Spend Matters PRO member for full access to the RFP spreadsheet – and access [...]

[More...]
 

When Procurement Met Siri: A Simple Future for Spend Analysis? (Part 2)

Jason Busch - April 30, 2013 5:49 AM | Categories: Technology

ampedup This post was co-authored by Jason Busch and Ryder Daniels. Yesterday, we introduced the concept of a simplified interface based on voice and text entry to access supplier and spend information. We also shared a number of sample queries (and screen mock-ups) to show how a text-based approach to this interface might work. But the larger transformative power of such approaches will come from more advanced use-cases and queries involving the combination of different internal and external datasets. Imagine being able to simple ask a procurement-focused Siri the following types of questions: What tier two suppliers are experiencing negative social [...]

[More...]
 

P2P and Network Buying Tips

Jason Busch - April 29, 2013 3:03 PM | Categories: Technology

I’ve purchased a few cars in my life from dealers (mostly used, mind you). I’ve also bought software – for my organization and many others. From these experiences, I’ve learned that in highly competitive markets where information transparency is also somewhat opaque (think used cars and supplier/business networks), there’s often greater opportunity for sales over-promises and vendor under-delivery (or hidden costs) that your sales rep either avoided or assured you would never happen. Some of the most competitive and ethically questionable sales tactics we’ve seen recently come not from used car lots, but from software salespeople in the P2P space [...]

[More...]
 

When Procurement Met Siri: A Simple Future for Spend Analysis? (Part 1)

Jason Busch - April 29, 2013 6:08 AM | Categories: Technology

future This post was co-authored by Jason Busch and Ryder Daniels. Even as data and visualization geeks, we’ll be the first to admit that we’ve overcomplicated our professional and personal lives with unnecessary and confusing interfaces that to a data analyst from another world, planet Earth is quite an amusing place. Consider BMW’s iDrive interface (a “convenience” in our car) in finding out about traffic on a designated route. To an advanced alien anthropologist peering at the activities of earthlings, it would really look like a bad joke that has done nothing but complicate life – and how to best get [...]

[More...]
 

Procurement Business Services: Part 1 – The Promise and The Problem

Pierre Mitchell - April 25, 2013 3:05 PM | Categories: Technology

When AG Lafley (ex-CEO of P&G) spawned the famous “Connect & Develop” program with the goal of shifting the majority of P&G innovation activity from within the corporate R&D department to outside of P&G, he was essentially betting on the power of supply markets. If there’s another department that should philosophically agree with this principle, it should be procurement – especially if it is trying to help the enterprise safely tap innovative supply lines rather than just being a PO pusher or deal negotiator. The good news is that procurement has a rich ecosystem (albeit fragmented) of solutions/services providers to [...]

[More...]
 

SciQuest Looks Ahead: Product Planning and Acquisition Integration (Part 1)

Jason Busch - April 19, 2013 3:03 PM | Categories: Technology

For a company its size, SciQuest has been among the most acquisitive of all providers in the procurement and supply chain solution sector (including technology, services, and broader solutions). These acquisitions include AECSoft (supplier management and sourcing), Upside (contract management) and, most recently, Spend Radar. See past coverage below: SciQuest Acquires AECSoft — P2P and Supplier Management Consolidation Accelerates(Spend Matters) AECSoft — A Quirky Vendor Finds a New Home with SciQuest (Spend Matters) SciQuest to Acquire Upside – “Upside” All Around or Not? (Spend Matters PRO) SciQuest Acquires Spend Radar: Company, Customer, Partner and Competitive Analysis and Recommendations (Part 1) (Spend Matters PRO) SciQuest Acquires [...]

[More...]
 

Coupa Inspire: Release Updates and Product Goodies – Expenses, Budgeting and Integration

Jason Busch - April 16, 2013 6:22 AM | Categories: Technology

budget At Coupa Inspire last week, Raja Hammoud, VP of Product Management, shared a number of updates to each of the modular areas of Coupa’s product suite. These include enhancements in expenses and budgeting. For its T&E/expense module, this includes adding an auto-classification expense engine that, once trained, can help drive automation and speed for users – and accuracy for administrators. The system can learn how to break down receipts and properly classify expenses by correct GL code. Coupa also includes TripIt integration on the T&E front. Coupa told the audience at Inspire that expense line itemization is “one of the [...]

[More...]
 

IBM Emptoris Version 10: Supplier Management and Virtual Supply Master Technology (Part 2)

Jason Busch - April 8, 2013 5:51 AM | Categories: Technology

manufacturing In reviewing the IBM Emptoris Virtual Supplier Master solution, one way to think about how the product fits in with other procurement tools, back-end systems and third-party information sources is to see it as a central hub or clearinghouse for information coming in from multiple sources. This may include, as we reviewed in the first installment of this series, third-party data services (like D&B) and internal systems (ERP, CRM, PLM). But it can also incorporate highly detailed procurement-related suite information from sourcing activities, contract management data, spend analysis and supplier management (supplier lifecycle management, in IBM Emptoris parlance) areas. Users [...]

[More...]
 

BravoSolution: Category-Specific Advanced Sourcing and Analytics (Part 1)

Jason Busch - April 5, 2013 3:09 PM | Categories: Technology

The Spend Matters team recently caught up with a number of the product and category minds behind BravoSolution’s products and solutions (including highly specialized solutions in transportation, packaging, MRO, and IT). We didn’t just discuss some of the nuanced analytical and sourcing approaches BravoSolution is applying to these individual categories, but also the findings from a Bravo-internal research study showing that companies that employ more advanced sourcing techniques are outperforming peers in operating margin and ROIC. In a research series exploring the latest from BravoSolution, we’ll look at a range of topics, including the quantification of three CFO-centered metrics focused [...]

[More...]
 

IBM Emptoris Version 10: Supplier Management and Virtual Supply Master Technology (Part 1)

Jason Busch - April 3, 2013 6:19 AM | Categories: Technology

carrying-boxes The Spend Matters team recently caught up with members of the IBM Emptoris product, technology and marketing teams to get a detailed demonstration and overview of some of the latest capabilities contained in IBM Emptoris Strategic Supply Management Version 10 (launched in December of 2012). The release is important for a number of reasons: It comes when there is an increasing willingness among users of sourcing, spend visibility, contract management and related solutions to evaluate their options given a combination of consolidation and new innovation in the market Compared to the time prior to the acquisition, IBM Emptoris have been [...]

[More...]
 

HICX Solutions: Supplier Management Meets Master Data (Part 2)

Thomas Kase - April 2, 2013 3:09 PM | Categories: Technology

Please click here for the first installment of this series. Supplier Onboarding as You Like It Supplier onboarding and registration isn’t always as simple as it seems. Companies can take several routes based on open and closed registration processes. In this area, we were pleased to see that HICX has adopted the open funnel approach – meaning that vendors can self-register (aka walk-in or cold-call) or be invited, and then follow the path toward providing more and more detailed information about themselves. The process has dynamic aspects (cascading questions with decision logic) and category code specific questions sets (a la [...]

[More...]
 

Hubwoo and Microsoft Partner: Customer, VAR and Competitor Analysis/Recommendations

Jason Busch - April 1, 2013 2:55 PM | Categories: Technology

It’s a given that the Microsoft and Hubwoo partnership has material potential to alter the balance of transactional power among B2B supplier networks if it takes off (while also potentially forcing the efficacy of dollar volume-based supplier fees for basic document exchange). But there are several other questions for Hubwoo and Microsoft Dynamics AX customers, Microsoft value added resellers (VARs) and competitors. Today, we’ll look at summary analysis and recommendations for these groups. Previous analysis can be found here: Microsoft and Hubwoo Partner: Dynamics, Business Networks and P2P (Public Site) Hubwoo and Microsoft Partner: Relationship Dynamics and Ecosystem (Spend Matters PRO Analysis) [...]

[More...]
 

HICX Solutions: Supplier Management Meets Master Data (Part 1)

Thomas Kase - March 29, 2013 3:04 PM | Categories: Technology

There are several supplier lifecycle management solutions on the market, but few have taken an approach that combines capabilities in the areas of supplier management, master data management and extended supply chain visibility. HICX Solutions (“HICX”), which is incorporated and headquartered in London, is one such provider. Founded in 2004 and privately held, HICX is owned in part by the two founders: the CEO, Konstantinos Xyloyiannis and the COO/CTO, Hassan Ismail. The company is not venture backed and has not invested material sums in marketing over the years (which is likely why, if you’re reading this, you’re not overly familiar with them). [...]

[More...]