How can technology help you use information more efficiently in your

procurement processes?

Tony Pringle

Managing Director

BvD UK & Ireland

Specialists in the provision of company information…

…delivered to enhance workflow and empower the end user

Global

UK

Europe

Global

UK

Europe

Information“Getting information off the Internet is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant.”

Mitchell Kapor

Information“Information is a source of learning. But unless it is organized, processed, and available to the right people in a format for decision making, it is a burden, not a benefit.”

William Pollard

Procurement - What’s the job?Genuine job descriptions...

• “Design and implementation of innovative procurement processes, policies and solutions”

• “Identification of pertinent new suppliers to ensure continued best-in-market service provision”

• “Ensuring departmental contribution to group savings initiatives are realised (c.£2.4m commitment for delivery in 2012), whilst maintaining and improving quality of services and goods”

Procurement - What’s the job?

• Efficiency

• Cost reduction

• Managing Risk

“Increase quality whilst reducing cost and avoiding risk”

What can data deliver?Promoting best practice and improving efficiency

• Adhering to the rules

What % of a supplier’s revenue does our business represent?

Are we buying from low risk businesses? Financial / Compliance

• Leveraging existing relationships

Are our suppliers part of a larger group we already buy from?

Are my current suppliers able to service us in other areas?

What can data deliver?Promoting best practice and improving efficiency

• Helping in tendering and negotiations

Identifying new alternative suppliers

Benchmarking suppliers for profitability

• ALERT me to strategic changes

Acquisitions

Negative financial trends / indicators

The data

A good understanding of data, its sources and the potential strengths and weaknesses are essential

Company data

Quoted companies (shares available on open exchanges)

• Everybody should do these well

• Stock exchanges, annual reports posted on web sites

• Often market research available to provide company profiles

• Industry context

• SWOT

• Competitors

• Forecasts

Company dataPrivate company data

Official bodies • UK - Companies House and the London and Edinburgh Gazettes

• Germany – Handelsregisters, Bundesanzeige

• France - greffe du tribunal de commerce

……etc

Primary research• Direct requests to the companies

Companies Act 2006

Accounts Exemption Thresholds for companies with accounting periods starting on or after 6th April 2008

Total audit exemption To qualify for total audit exemption, a company must:

• Qualify as small• Have a turnover of not more than £6.5 million• Have a balance sheet total of not more than £3.26 million

Small company To be a small company, at least two of the following conditions must be met:

• Annual turnover must be £6.5 million or less• The balance sheet total must be £3.26 million or less• The average number of employees must be 50 or fewer

Small group To qualify as small, a group of companies must meet at least two of the following conditions:

• Aggregate turnover must be £6.5 million net (or £7.8 million gross) or less• The aggregate balance sheet total must be £3.26 million net (or £3.9 million gross) or less• The aggregate average number of employees must be 50 or fewer

Medium companies etc…..

http://www.companieshouse.gov.uk/about/gbhtml/gp2.shtml#ch7

Companies house data rules

Company data

• US

- Most US private companies are not required to file financial data at all

- information providers will sometimes estimate a company’s revenue or sales

• Europe

- profit and loss

- balance sheet

- director details

•no centralised 'Companies House', instead there are thousands of registration bureaux

•Registration Bureaux do not provide any detailed information – in some cases only allow name, legal representative and status to be viewed by public (check if a company is still active – aim to prevent fake companies operating)

•you can’t take copies or notes of papers in a company's file, and it is necessary to visit the relevant locations to view the files in the first place (and of course everything is in Chinese)

•If companies don’t file they lose their registration – the extent to which this is enforced varies regionally

China

Company data

• Asia

- Varies country to country

- Some official source and some has to be requested eg Japan

- Taiwan

• Africa, Middle East, South America

- Improving all the time

- Argentina

- Brazil

Company data

What's new on Orbis – September 2012

• There are now 101 million companies on Orbis• In the last month:• over 2.8 million company accounts have been updated• over 3.8 million new companies have been added

 • Brazil - nearly 2.8 million new companies• Israel - over 356,000 new companies• United States - over 133,000 new companies

Company data

Other primary research

• Verification process for contact data

- “can you confirm that...”

- Names, e-mails, turnover, employees

• Enriching descriptive content

-“other business services” (Companies House, SIC description)

- “This company is engaged in the electronic publishing of company information and

business intelligence. It was established in 1991 as a separate entity following a division of

activities within Bureau Marcel van Dijk. …specialises in adding value to data to create easy-

to-use, flexible and state-of-the-art solutions that allow users to manipulate information for

research, financial analysis and marketing intelligence… serves a client base of

approximately 5,000 businesses…” (Overview from BvD)

Matching internal to external data

The process of connecting records from an internal system (such as a SRM) to a data

provider’s unique reference number

Cloud computing allows you to access everything you need, from anywhere, on any computer. You can access this information without worrying if you have enough room for

all of it, or where it is stored.

Bringing “live” data to you

Matching

Accuracy of matching drives the benefits

• As accurate as possible

• BvD doesn’t get linked to Bureau van Dijk without human intervention

• Engaging in the process is a wise investment

Matching - data management

• Removing businesses that are no longer trading

• Identifying multiple records and consolidating

• Replacing old content with new

• Adding data points to existing records for richer content

• Adding new records that look like your current suppliers

Matching - profiling

Using third party software

Segmentation– Size

– Activity

– Location

– Risk

“More like this”

Matching - monitoring and alerts

• Changes in control (business ownership)

• Recently resigned, or new, directors

• New financial data

• Increase in financial risk - Liquidation

• Business critical news– Jobs

– Contracts

– Restructuring

– Strategy

Using technology to deliver data

“The goal is to transform data into information, and information into insight”

Carly Fiorina (Executive and president of Hewlett-Packard Co. in 1999. Chairperson in 2000.

Using technology to deliver data

Introduce valuable external content into existing work flows

• process driven

• delivering content to the right people….

…at the right time