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| Case Study |
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Global procurement data warehouse
enhances sourcing intelligence
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By building a centralized global procurement data warehouse, Patni helped a leader in integrated
communications improve its spend analysis process on different product categories across a diverse set of
suppliers.
The Client
The client is a global leader in
providing integrated
communications and embedded
electronic solutions.
The Challenge
The client followed an independent sourcing strategy for each of its different
Lines of Business (LOBs). The lack of a centralized mechanism for sourcing
products hampered the client's ability to negotiate effectively with its
suppliers and realize cost benefits of scale.
To improve its sourcing process, the client decided to centralize its
procurement processes by building a comprehensive data warehouse that
would help the client in improving the procurement initiatives of the different
LOBs, in spend analysis of different product categories, and in monitoring
supplier performance. The objective was to reduce purchasing cycle time,
improve process efficiencies and reduce procurement costs.
The Solution
Patni used its Business Intelligence development roadmap based on IIDM
(Interactive and Iterative development methodology) to develop a centralized
data warehouse that captured data from different transactional systems across
the globe. Starting off with requirements gathering, Patni assisted the client in
design validation, identifying data integrity issues, defining data elements and
testing the system to ensure that the deployed system met key business
requirements.
With a planned roadmap, Patni helped the client in successfully integrating data
from more than 35 diverse sources (ERP systems, B2B Exchanges, home grown
applications) of transactional systems. Simultaneously, Patni was also involved in
parallel development, enhancement and support projects related to the
centralized global data warehouse.
The Technology
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Tools
- ETL: Informatica
Power Center 7.0
- Reporting:
Informatica Power
Analyzer 4.1, 5 |
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Database: Oracle 8i |
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Operating System: UNIX.
DB2 |
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Portal Management:
TIBCO
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Application Servers: Tomcat 5.x, Weblogic 7.0 |
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Web Server: iPlanet 6.0 |
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Operating System: Sun Solaris 2.8 |
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The Benefits
The procurement data warehouse has provided a single view of
the different sourcing initiatives undertaken by various LOBs.
The data warehouse captures over 98% of the spend information
across the organization from direct and indirect sources
(material receipts, purchase orders, purchase receipts,
accounts payable systems). Further, the quality of data
maintained in the data warehouse has increased confidence in
the accuracy of the data.
Other significant benefits include:
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Global spend analysis across direct and indirect spends by
supplier, type of commodity, and facility |
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Ability to identify variance of component pricing on a contract
versus actual receipt pricing across all sectors and
commodities |
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Improved cost savings due to consolidation of procurement
systems of multiple lines of business across the organization |
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Ability to track cost reductions and actual savings on
purchased parts against goals |
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Ability to report spend/savings against commodities and
suppliers through a company-wide segmentation process that
enables supply base optimization and maximization of
leverage |
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Ability to track performance through metrics such as spend vs
goal, savings from baseline calculation, PO to invoice cycle
time, actuals against budget, and actuals against forecast. |
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