Manufacturer taps Verticalnet solution to gain spend visibility, insight across 600 operating divisions and $5 billion in spend
Malvern, PA — December 11, 2003 — Illinois Tool Works has selected a spend analysis solution from Verticalnet to gain visibility and insight into its North American direct and indirect materials spending.
Glenview, Ill.-based ITW is a $9.5 billion diversified manufacturer with approximately 600 decentralized business units in 44 countries.
ITW will use the analytical capabilities in Verticalnet's Spend Analysis solution to identify strategic sourcing opportunities across the company's divisions in North America. Additionally, ITW will also utilize the solution to perform price audits to ensure compliance and monitor on- versus off-contract purchasing.
According to Verticalnet, ITW selected the provider's solution after previewing the potential value first-hand through Verticalnet's Spend Diagnostic program, which enables companies to see the potential value that could be delivered through the solution by using their actual data before spending any money on software or services.
"We selected the Verticalnet solution because they provided the best solution and capabilities which will allow us immediate insight into our spend across our diversified business units without disrupting our existing systems," said Gary Anton, ITW's vice president of strategic sourcing. "Another important factor in our decision-making process revolves around implementation of the software, which will not require a lengthy implementation or services engagement."
Anton explained that ITW is a highly acquisitive company with disparate systems and decentralized purchasing organizations. In order to gain enterprise-wide spending and contract visibility, the company's spend data needs to be extracted, cleansed and normalized from many systems across its divisions and locations without disruption to the company's day to day purchasing operations.
"We also required analytical tools to help identify the best opportunities for sourcing as well as measure compliance," Anton said. "As Verticalnet proved during the Spend Diagnostic and through our customer site visits, their solution greatly automates and expedites this process."
Verticalnet's holistic solution was also a factor in ITW's selection process, according to Anton. "Verticalnet's broad base of Supply Management solutions was important to us," he said. "The visibility and insight provided by our enterprise-wide spend analysis will undoubtedly uncover additional opportunities to drive value from our supply management processes, and we expect Verticalnet to be a key partner for us to continue to achieve measurable, sustainable improvements."
