Saas/Cloud solutions, Big Data, mobile technologies and social media… What impact are these new technologies having on the Procurement function? The Spend Management software company Ivalua provides us with some computer graphics to answer that question.
Cloud solutions, the n°1 priority of procurement departments
From here to 2020, Cloud solutions are the top priority for buyers in terms of digital transformation, ahead of Big Data, mobile and social media. This trend owes much to the 3 key benefits that these solutions offer:
1 – Innovation
2 – Scalability and modularity
3 – Cost.
In concrete terms, the Cloud enables procurement departments to create new services for business units, to improve the quality of the services they provide, and to optimise collaboration and the quality of relations with suppliers.
The impacts of Big Data, mobile and social media
These three tools also have plenty to offer the procurement function, however. Each of them proposes specific benefits:
- Big Data for:
- Predicting and analysing supplier risk, and managing it more effectively
- Analysing spending and identifying sources of savings
- Improving the efficiency and agility of the procurement organisation.
- Mobile for:
- Managing the working hours of procurement teams more flexibly
- Ensuring rapid access to information
- Securing validations
- Reducing transaction costs.
- Social media for:
- Improving communication with suppliers
- Enhancing collaboration between procurement and business units
- Increasing transparency on the role, missions and objectives of the procurement function.
The digital transformation of the procurement function has now gone strategic. It depends to a large degree on the implementation of these tools, combined, of course, with internal change management across all of the teams. Which technology is your own Procurement Department currently exploring?
