Aberdeen announces plans to expand sourcing and procurement capabilities in 2005
Boston, MA — December 9, 2004 — As part of its commitment to providing research to the global business community, AberdeenGroup said it plans to expand its sourcing and procurement capabilities in 2005.
Tim Minahan, Aberdeen's senior vice president, supply research and strategy, commented that globalization, procurement automation, outsourcing and rapidly changing supply market dynamics have elevated the procurement discipline and increased supply management challenges.
Faced with these dynamics, procurement executives must improve the skill sets of their teams, adopt new sourcing, compliance, and supply management strategies, and improve systems infrastructures to drive continuous improvements in supply costs and performance and to deliver strategic value to the enterprise, he said.
According to Jamie Bedard, Aberdeen's president and CEO, The evolution of supply chain management and the need businesses have for a meaningful flow of relevant information on related issues made the expansion of our sourcing and research capabilities a natural goal for the coming year.
Bedard said Aberdeen plans to hire several new researchers devoted to sourcing and procurement, expand the firm's benchmarking and surveying of the sector, and debut a series of Supply Management Best Practices Workshops in regional markets across the country.
Bedard further indicated that these workshops are reserved for supply management executives and are designed to address their issues of concern. These workshops are intended to be intimate, hands-on workshops focused on trading practical lessons learned and fact-based research insight, he said.
In the course of its research, Aberdeen has examined sourcing and procurement practices at thousands of enterprises, including benchmarking supply management operations at more 2,500 enterprises year to date. These efforts have recently included the examination of spend compliance management practices at more than 125 enterprises and benchmarking of over 100 enterprises through Aberdeen's Contract Management Center of Excellence.
Johnathon Baker, director, supply chain strategy, of Delta Air Lines, said, Delta has used AberdeenGroup research to benchmark our supply management performance and as a good indicator of technology-enabled sourcing and procurement strategies.
