siliconindia | | July 20168HOW CAN TECHNOLOGY BE USED TO MITIGATE RISING PROCUREMENT COSTS?By Sunil Gupta, Director-Group Procurement, Walgreens Boots AllianceIn My OPINIONSunil Gupta>rocurement is almost always viewed as a cost center. A Chief Procurement Officer (CPO) has to repeatedly justify the operating costs of the procurement team. However, despite proving on several occasions that procurement can drive efficiency and deliver value; organizations often oversee this attribute and fail to gain visibility in to their supply chain. There is no debating that tight control on spending is an enabler to long-term success of an organization. It is crucial to have the knowledge of what is being bought, by whom and from whom. But is it really possible to navigate vast amount of complex procurement data to drive this intelligence without investing in technology? Not really. Technology, when invested in wisely, can open the doors to endless opportunities for procurement particularly. There are several solutions available today that can support procurement life cycle­contracts to procurement activities to spend analysis.A contract management system (CMS) can simplify contract lifecycle activities. It helps from drafting terms and templates to being a communication and version control tool for contract negotiations. It also acts as a repository of contracts where all the electronic documents can be stored in one centralized location with controlled access to authorized users in the organization. These solutions have the capability to alert users for upcoming contract expirations, keep a tally of rebate dollars due and create a searchable database. The tool makes it really easy for procurement professionals to create a pipeline of activities by simply looking at what contracts they have coming up for renewals and which ones haven't been negotiated for quite a while. They can also search the database if they want to find contracts with a specific clause. For example: 30 days term for convenience or Net 60 days payment terms. Finally, some CMS also enables supplier performance management P
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