Efficio’s eFlow: S2C Vendor Analysis (Part 1) — Company background, high-level solution overview, SWOT, competitors/market analysis

This three-part Spend Matters PRO Vendor Analysis focuses on Efficio’s eFlow, the company's S2C solution. Part 1 provides a company background and high-level solution overview, gives a company SWOT analysis and discusses competitors. The next two parts will focus on product strengths/weaknesses and tech selection tips as well as an in-depth look at the S2C solution and our analyst summary.

London-based Efficio is the world's largest pure-play procurement and supply chain consultancy (i.e., not part of a larger consultancy or BPO firm where more prominent procurement players exist) that helps customers reduce costs, improve internal processes and upskill their procurement teams to deliver more with their teams and become high-value generating functions for their businesses.

However, Efficio developed a proprietary S2C solution, eFlow, to, at the origin, support its own teams who were delivering consultancy projects. eFlow is now part of Efficio’s blended value proposition that includes services and technology. eFlow is also a means to make procurement transformation initiatives more sustainable as attempts to do so are often short-lived. In fact, an organization can often be compared to jelly (jello): attempts to change it will, at best, give a little shiver, momentarily, and then it immediately returns to its pre-existing shape and carries on, with business as usual, as though nothing has happened. Efficio uses eFlow to make changes stick and to remain engaged with customers.

After a more or less long period, companies that have gone through such transformation often see diminishing returns and leakages. On the contrary, Efficio leaves a concrete piece of technology, which allows clients to continue to see value from their work in the procurement transformation.

Here’s why eFlow matters:

• To the market — Efficio provides a blended mix of services and technology to ensure that customers successfully ramp up their capabilities in a sustainable way. eFlow, its S2C solution, is the cornerstone of that value proposition as it embeds a wealth of general and contextualized content and knowledge delivered and maintained by Efficio’s experts.
• To customers — Efficio’s customers benefit from the company's experience to identify savings opportunities and leverage eFlow to capture them.
• To potential buyers — eFlow can be implemented quickly as part of an overall initiative to enhance and improve S2C capabilities by benefiting from more than just features. It embeds deep experience and knowledge from Efficio’s category SMEs and acts as the delivery channel of the company’s consulting activities.

This Spend Matters PRO Vendor Analysis gives an overview of the vendor’s capabilities, its competitors, provides tech selection tips and closes with key analyst takeaways.