Broadening the CPO Mandate Through Procurement BPO

What if CPOs could buy “procurement-in-a-box”? Imagine being able to hand a category to a team of category experts who sources the same category five or six times per year – in different regions across the globe. Consider being handed all the technology you need to source, buy, and report. Suppose you had the flexibility to immediately address new categories or strategic projects without considering internal bandwidth and skill gaps.

Until 2010, CPOs relied on internal resources and expensive consultants, but no longer. According to our data collected in 2011, one after another — in fact, over 400 CPOs — have made the decision to leverage procurement BPO to improve their scope, savings, and ROI, and they are finding incredible success. HfS Research collected detailed data points on more than 430 procurement outsourcing engagements, indicating that procurement outsourcing is a viable option for companies of all sizes. In each of the past three years, 60 new companies have leveraged procurement outsourcing services.

This RapidInsight™ describes the scope of services CPOs are purchasing and the results they are achieving, while explaining why procurement outsourcing doesn’t have many of the issues faced by other BPO services.