Want Better Spend Visibility? Need More Control Over Spend?

Spend Analysis is a valuable requirement of any procurement function. Particularly, where procurement is conducted by dispersed buyers across many business units and supported by many disparate purchasing & payment systems. We believe that getting this activity right is fundamental to better sourcing. Spend Analysis is the springboard to more control & more savings; a return that’s many multiples of the investment.

Getting it right, means spend analysis that’s accessible, accurate and relevant. At PRGX Analytics, that’s exactly what we are focused on delivering. We are a highly specialised analytics organisation with class leading spend analysis at the core of our services; so the solution gets constant attention and fine tuning.

Our customers include global and FTSE100 multinationals across financial services and manufacturing sectors and also major government bodies.

We believe Spend Analysis is a combination of great technology and great service. Our solution is tailored to meet your requirements and is designed to grow with changes in need or organisational structure. Over-time, that’s the kind of attention to detail which pays dividends to the procurement team.

There are also different depths of analysis and range of reporting available. We believe our solution provides the most detailed (‘line level’) analysis available and the widest range of reports. The benefits are better accuracy, more usable information and reporting which can inform savings and efficiencies throughout the procure to pay process.

Creating a user specific experience.

Our spend analysis solution is delivered via our web application PRGX SpendTrax™. Key features of the "software as a service" system include:

• Accessibility: PRGX SpendTrax™ is an advanced web based application, providing fast access to a widely dispersed user-base through a standard internet browser
• Secure: The application is controlled by user access rights and data passed over the internet is fully encrypted. We maintain rigorous access and physical controls over the supporting servers and central databases.
• Personalisation: The application uses the best of current internet technologies to create a user specific experience; allowing users to focus on categories, suppliers and contracts of interest.
• Collaboration: We create a single consistent view of spend data which can be shared by a host of users. Additional data and information can be appended by all users, creating a true centralised knowledge environment around which collaborative spend management activities can be undertaken.
• Accuracy: PRGX Analytics specialized in working with varying qualities of spend data; we pride ourselves on creating accurate and consistent spend classifications and data enhancements – tailored to meet the reporting requirements of your organisation.
• Dynamic Reporting: The PRGX SpendTrax™ application enables users to access the data easily and on-demand. Reporting is presented at executive, operational and advanced-user levels; with reporting structures comprising graphs, charts, tables and drill through capability between reporting hierarchies all the way down to the actual line-level transactional data.

Taking our customers on a journey of data improvement.

Useful spend data often resides in numerous disparate localised business systems, some obvious and some not so obvious. Our experienced data team will work with you to help identify systems that should be in scope for a spend analysis project, ensuring that critical spend data does not get missed. They will also provide your local IT Team with support over data collection and extraction.

Once data has been identified and extracted it is then received into our data centre, via our secure upload facility, into our single data warehouse for transformation. The web upload facility has full data stamp audit facilities to ensure that data is securely and completely receipted. We provide routine cleansing of data before loading data into our data warehouse. Upon data receipt, fields are examined for completeness and consistency, and a data quality report is issued.

Experience tells us that data availability and quality will vary significantly across organisations. PRGX SpendTrax™ delivers value to differing data qualities and whilst we can only work within the limitations of the data, we aim to take our customers on a journey of data improvement

Cleanse, Normalise and Enrich.

PRGX SpendTrax™ can take data from any data source, cleanse, normalise and enrich the data before mapping it to a common taxonomy (which is customized or bespoke to each client but typically a hybrid version of UNSPSC). As part of the enrichment process we utilise internal and third party data sources; we can append additional information such as turnover, number of employees, SME / BME data, and proximity / regional impact to the supplier file.

Using Soundex algorithms and our in house scrub and match tools supplier details are isolated and matched against third party data sources to provide a standardised vendor master, filling in missing or unclean data. As part of this process we will append family tree analysis to support hierarchical supplier negotiations.

Ensure ongoing consistency.

PRGX SpendTrax™ transactional data is then mapped using intelligence gained from a number of different sources and the most appropriate mapping is applied. Mapping is applied to GL codes, item master, invoice header, invoice detail and purchase order.

Mapping rules are applied depending upon the quality and level of data receipted. Items which cannot be mapped with any degree of confidence are subject to a user review and the mapping rules are amended in order to improve the accuracy of future mapping. The final mapping is subject to a quality review and substantive sampling. The mapping engine is tailored and maintained at a client level to ensure ongoing consistency.

Working with you to suggest data improvements.

We are able to support clients to constantly monitor spend and more effectively track savings over time through refreshes to the PRGX SpendTrax™ reporting suite. We can support a variety of data refresh frequencies, entirely configurable to client needs and budgets.

As part of our service we consult with our clients on each data refresh using our data management expertise to suggest data structure improvements which will enhance the granularity of results from ongoing data refreshes. We seek to ensure that a repeatable data extract process is developed to fully capture reporting and taxonomy requirements. All data refreshes are mapped against prior mapping rules created at the transformation stage at a material level to ensure consistency. Exception reporting identifies new vendors / GL codes, material items. Unmapped items are isolated, quality checked and re-mapped.

Build bespoke, on demand reports tailored for you.

PRGX SpendTrax™ has hundreds of predefined reports delivering value across procurement, finance,and data quality departments. This is supplemented by the capability to build on demand reports using the PRGX SpendTrax™ OLAP report builder. Key reporting parameters are tailored to client specifications upon installation. To support the tailoring we will meet with key client stake holders to agree and sign-off the reporting requirements. Spend Analysis

• How fragmented is my supplier base?
• Can I rationalise it to deliver cost savings?
• How much spend is with key suppliers?
• Can I channel more spend to them to lower costs?
• Do we buy similar services across the group?
• Can we collaborate to bulk-buy and lower cost?

The reporting suite provides a wide array of metrics and comprises of drill through reporting (allow easy navigation from high level reports and charts down to actual line level detail).

Rationalisation
Supplier rationalisation is the first stage in securing savings and helping clients achieve optimum efficiency. In doing so there is a need to have the appropriate management information to support the critical decisions of internal requirements - and also consider the external commercial and social impacts. PRGX SpendTrax™ will uniquely support you in identifying rationalisation opportunities but also can provide the softer metrics to enable you to minimise the social impacts of such a program.

Maverick Spending
The management of "maverick spend" is the second step in ensuring savings are captured and maintained. Recent reports have estimated that the premium paid for goods and services purchased outside of normal processes and procedures is estimated at >20% - not to mention the additional costs of process and administration. PRGX SpendTrax™ will not only highlight the extent of "maverick spend" but also provide the tools to ensure that it is monitored and controlled on an going basis.

Strategic Sourcing
PRGX SpendTrax™ is tailored to identify fragmented spend categories and “quick wins”. These quick wins incorporate supplier and price consolidation opportunities (where different parts of the organisation may be paying different prices for identical goods and services from the same vendor). PRGX SpendTrax™ will support your strategic sourcing objectives and provides reporting to enable you to:

• Reduce the number of vendors used for each supply category
• Establish partnership relationships with key suppliers in relevant supply categories
• Negotiate better terms with vendors as a consequence of improved knowledge of what you are spending with them and their affiliates, and concentrating spend on a smaller number of core suppliers in each category
• Actively manage and develop key suppliers and their performance

Zero Cost Implementation
One of the biggest barriers facing executives wishing to exploit the benefits of good spend intelligence is a lack of budget. Even though there is a wealth of market evidence to show the potential return on investment for spend analysis, convincing the CFO, COO or CEO to invest in this type of project can be a challenge.

However, PRGX Analytics is in a unique position to give customers with funding issues the option to still develop and extract the benefits from a spend analysis solution. In certain circumstances PRGX Analytics is able to offer a ZERO COST implementation of SpendtraX™.

To find out if you could qualify for a ZERO COST implementation please contact us and one of our consultants will review your information and contact you to discuss your options.

If your circumstances are not suitable for a ZERO COST implementation, you may still benefit from a LOW COST implementation. PRGX Analytics has a range of innovative commercial structures that can help overcome budgetary constraints. PRGX SpendTraX™ has one of the fastest return on investments in the market.