P&G Continues CombineNet Sourcing Relationship
Long-time customer Procter & Gamble has extended its license for CombineNet's Advanced Sourcing Application Platform through 2008. Since 2002, Procter & Gamble has used CombineNet's advanced sourcing technologies and services to source its materials and services, steadily increasing the number of sourcing events and spend categories processed through CombineNet's technology annually.
CombineNet says the cost and time savings delivered by its technology, as well as the increased efficiency and innovation transfer between P&G and its suppliers, has led the manufacturer to increase its enterprise-wide use of CombineNet's Advanced Sourcing Application Platform across multiple spend categories, from direct and indirect materials such as raw ingredients and packaging, to services such as transportation, housekeeping and legal services. CombineNet and Procter & Gamble have also instituted teams to identify new areas of spend within Procter & Gamble to accelerate the use of CombineNet's technology.
P&G has used CombineNet technologies in optimizing the bid collection, negotiation, scenario analysis and award allocation for a diverse range of spend categories. Events in the direct and indirect spends have included pulp, plastic injection molded parts, vials, films, non-wovens, labels, corrugate, cartons, temporary displays, lab supplies, spare parts, and capital equipment.
Events in transportation have included ocean freight for dry and "iso" containers, truckload transportation, small parcel, and logistics services.
Events in the services category have included marketing, pre-press services, janitorial, lab equipment calibration, security, and legal services.
"In our continuing effort to provide the best products at affordable prices, Procter & Gamble leverages CombineNet technology to drive value and efficiency across our entire supply chain," says Rick Hughes, P&G vice president of purchasing. "We've benefited greatly from CombineNet's ability to identify the absolute best solution for our most strategic spends with exceptional results and we will continue to find new ways to incorporate CombineNet into our sourcing strategy."
http://www.combinenet.com
Dairy Queen Uses Sourcing, Procurement Software from Iasta
Supply management solution provider Iasta Inc. has extended its e-sourcing software and services footprint within the restaurant and foodservice industries in a new contract with International Dairy Queen Inc. The chain has chosen Iasta SmartSource to its simplify procurement process.
"We spent several months analyzing available technologies," says Will Costello, vice president of purchasing at International Dairy Queen Inc. "Iasta provides a great value with its optimization-based sourcing features as well as its global support services. The software enhances our analysis capabilities, enabling us to consider multiple supply chain scenarios in dramatically compressed time frames. For supply chain management, the tools and services are invaluable."
Iasta says SmartSource features the industry's most powerful decision optimization engine, which enables users to analyze complex award scenarios with constraint-based filters. Its e-RFx technology fuels the procurement process, enabling users to create, distribute, and analyze RFI, RFQ, and RFP documents with streamlined communication between respondents/bidders as well as improved internal collaboration. Iasta technology rivals the most advanced optimization solutions in the e-sourcing industry--without the high maintenance costs and professional services typically associated with this technology.
"Decision optimization technology is a very powerful tool that is used by strategic sourcing leaders to build the proper award allocations through constraint based mathematical modeling," says David Bush, vice president of business development at Iasta. "This ... has established Iasta as the value-leading expert within restaurant and food industry sectors."
http://www.iasta.com.
Developments in Supply Chain Finance May Help in Sourcing from Low-Cost Countries
For companies sourcing from low-cost countries, new developments in the supply chain finance arena may help extend the financial benefits already realized from their current low-cost country sourcing strategy, allowing them to lower risk and overall costs of their end-to-end supply chain and make their supply base more reliable, according to Aberdeen Research.
http://www.aberdeen.com
Manage Temporary Labor Procurement More Effectively
Companies are generally diligent when it comes to keeping a tight rein on direct material procurement. But it's a different story when it comes to procurement of indirect materials and services, especially temporary labor, also known as staff augmentation, according to an article in Supply Chain Strategy, --a newsletter from the MIT Center for Transportation and Logistics.
Too many enterprises manage their temporary labor needs in a simplistic way. They centralize their sourcing with preferred suppliers, or stop at streamlining the temporary staff procure-to-pay processes. In fast-growing companies the procurement group may not have a good handle on temporary labor expenditures managed by multiple business ups and with multiple suppliers, according to authors Rajesh Mani and Venu Venugopa. They propose a systematic way to lower temporary labor costs while maintaining service levels.
http://www.ctl.mit.edu
Survey to Benchmark Global Airfreight Procurement Process
Roy Lenders, head of Capgemini's European management consulting activities in the field of transport, warehousing and distribution, notes in the current issue of his sourcing and procurement newsletter that a director of global logistics procurement for one of the top three high-tech manufacturers wants to benchmark international airfreight procurement process.
"Since we believe this topic can be relevant for our other newsletter readers as well," writes Lenders, "we have decided together to hold a survey among our newsletter readers. All participants to the survey will get access to the survey results.
Completing the survey questionnaire will take no more than 5 minutes and focuses on the procurement process for international airfreight. It focuses on the scope, timing and frequency of the RFQ processes, the RFQ participants, inclusion of surcharges, the approach on dimensions and volumetric weight and the ease of LSP replacement.
Please participate in the survey to benchmark your own international airfreight procurement process against one of the largest shippers in the world. The survey questionnaire is open until Nov. 30, 2006. You will receive the survey results in the month of December 2006."
http://www.surveymonkey.com
Procure Print Services Online to Save 23 Percent in Hard-Dollar Costs
Best-in-class enterprises save as much as 23 percent in hard-dollar costs for print procurement, according the Category Spend Management: Print and Print Services report. These same companies source and procure 64 percent of their print online, which means that they have standardized policies that involve the procurement function.
Aberdeen Research invites you to download a complimentary copy of the report and learn how to optimize this category of spend management.
http://www.aberdeen.com
