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Turning AI Category Strategies into Action

Coupa’s recent acquisition of Cirtuo results in an AI-native category management solution that seamlessly translates robust, data-driven strategies into sourcing pipelines, supplier actions, and savings. It supports the full supplier strategy lifecycle, from strategy planning to execution and monitoring — all within a unified system.

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Made for each other: Sourcing + Contract Management + Procurement

Accelerate value delivered from sourcing events by seamlessly converting awards into contracts and catalogs used for purchasing and invoice validation. Tight connections with buying enable automatic creation of spot buys based on rules to simplify tail spend management and free up sourcing resources.

FAQs

What is a category?

Fundamentally, categories are groups of goods and services that customers buy. Many companies run sourcing events to get these items. These events deliver a lot of value, but a one-size-fits-all approach may result in some objectives being misaligned with category needs and category needs that aren’t addressed at all. Category management is a more strategic way to build alignment that optimizes outcomes and creates additional margin impact.

 

What is category management?

Category management is a nuanced approach that centers on spend categories to create additional margin impact.

Think for a moment about the categories of spend that exist in your company. Are some of them strategically relevant to the business – as in, will you face downtime and revenue loss if a delivery is missed? Or are some categories more transaction-based, where cost is the focus and processes could be more efficient?

This will guide you from pursuing the right category management strategies to securing these goods and services. Category management software can help you, for example, know when to talk to suppliers about setting up strategic partnerships or optimizing invoicing channels and catalog management to prevent bottlenecks.

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