CPO Rising’s Technology Round-Up Series returns today with fresh supply management technology news and updates covering a few recent major announcements. If you are a sourcing, procurement, or spend management solution provider and you are continually innovating the way that procurement and supply chain leaders and practitioners drive value, we’d love to hear from you. Please drop us a note at info at cporising dot com. Thanks, and enjoy!
Ivalua Launches Collaboration and AI-Powered Innovations
REDWOOD CITY, Calif. — Ivalua, a global leader in cloud spend management solutions, announced the general availability of its new platform release 174. The release includes a broad set of innovations to empower procurement and supply chain leaders to improve collaboration among internal stakeholders and suppliers, proactively mitigate supplier risk and performance issues, gain efficiency and visibility in contracting, and improve guidance and effectiveness across procure to pay.
The company outlined two major enhancements to its platform.
AI-powered contract management. Ivalua enhanced its leading CLM solution with AI-Powered Contract Data Capture. Customers will now be able to accelerate contract cycle times with AI-driven document segmentation, clause classification, and metadata extraction. These optical character recognition (OCR) and AI services will also digitize, classify, and extract key metadata from large volumes of contracts, bringing much-needed visibility and compliance to legacy contracts.
Message Center with embedded chat functionality. As part of the release, Ivalua launched a new Message Center, enabling seamless collaboration across the platform. The Message Center is an embedded chat functionality that provides collaboration and contextual discussions amongst internal users and suppliers.
According to Pascal Bensoussan, chief product officer for Ivalua, “In today’s dynamic and challenging global economy, the ability to effectively collaborate with internal stakeholders and suppliers is critical to business success,” he said. “Our new release will further boost collaboration and greatly enhance automation and efficiency. This will free up more valuable time for users to manage critical issues around supply disruption, price volatility, as well as environmental, social, and governance risks.”
Read the full announcement here.
Zip Secures $43 Million Series B at a $1.2 Billion Valuation to Solve Procurement and Workflow Challenges
SAN FRANCISCO — Zip, a leading intake-to-procure solution, announced its $43 million Series B funding round led by YC Continuity with participation from Tiger Global and CRV. This brings Zip’s total funding to $81 million and the company’s valuation to $1.2 billion in just 18 months since its founding, with its $25 million Series A and multiple seed-round investments in that time frame.
According to Ali Rowghani, managing partner at YC Continuity, “The simple task of buying software or services has become hopelessly complicated at even the most innovative companies in the world. As purchasing has become increasingly decentralized, many stakeholders in the process — finance, legal, IT, and the business users themselves — have become increasingly frustrated,” Rowghani said.
“Zip is the first single source of truth for a modern decentralized procurement process. Zip provides an intuitive front door and clear visualization of the entire workflow so that each stakeholder has visibility into what’s going on,” he adds.
Read the full announcement here.
Icertis CEO Joins 2,000 CEOs in Pledge to Advance Diversity and Inclusion in the Workplace
BELLEVUE, Wash. — Icertis, a leading contract intelligence company, announced that its CEO and Co-founder Samir Bodas has joined the growing coalition pledging to advance diversity and inclusion in the workplace.
As a new member of the CEO Action for Diversity & Inclusion™ initiative, and to foster an environment of belonging, Icertis is conducting unconscious bias training for all executives and managers. Additionally, the company recently expanded its domestic partner definition for insurance benefits in India, improving healthcare access for current and future LGBTQ Icertians.
According to Bodas, “Diversity, equity, and inclusion is an active and ongoing effort that is incredibly important to me and a priority for our organization as a whole,” he said. “As an international organization, we know that committing to diversity, equity, and inclusion builds strength and value globally. Our leadership team ensures that each of our regions advances a unique set of DEI objectives that ensure Icertians are empowered, heard, and fully supported.”
CEO Action for Diversity & Inclusion™ is cultivating a new type of ecosystem centered around collaboration and sharing. The collective of more than 2,000 signatories has already shared more than 1,400+ best-known actions, exchanging tangible learning opportunities and creating collaborative conversations via the initiative’s unified hub, CEOAction.com.
By signing on to this commitment, Icertis pledges to cultivate a workplace where diverse perspectives and experiences are welcomed and respected and where Icertians feel encouraged to discuss diversity and inclusion.
Read the full announcement here.
Beroe Partners with Positive to Enable Procurement Learning
RALEIGH, N.C. — Beroe Inc, a global SaaS-based procurement intelligence and analytics provider, announced its strategic partnership with global procurement and negotiation platform and training company Positive Purchasing.
The pandemic and continued supply chain volatility is putting more pressure on procurement to deliver value beyond cost savings. Thus, now is the time to invest in tools for continuous learning as procurement professionals adjust to the new normal marketplace.
The company states that the move makes Positive Purchasing’s digital platform, Procleus®, available on Beroe LIVE.Ai®, an AI-powered productivity suite that provides access to the latest procurement and supply chain tools, templates, and digital learning, combined with market-leading procurement intelligence and analytics.
Beroe’s CEO Vel Dhinagaravel, says, “Our collaboration with Positive is an important move towards enabling procurement practitioners with the right tools, data, and intelligence to make smarter sourcing decisions.”
Read the full announcement here.
HRS Acquires Paypense, Enabling Widescale Digitized Payment Technology for Corporations and Employees
COLOGNE, Germany — HRS, a leading global corporate travel and payment technology platform, announced the acquisition of Germany-based Paypense, enhancing the company’s growing compilation of efficient corporate payment offerings.
Only two years since launch, Paypense’s open platform has already made inroads with a broad range of corporations, enabling employees to use digital payment technology to pay for all work-related purchases.
According to Tobias Ragge, HRS CEO, “HRS Pay, reinforced by years of proprietary investments and our 2021 purchase of Itelya to propel the digital transformation of payment, is taking the next step in delivering an exceptional ‘in destination experience’ for corporate employees,” he said. “Paypense provides intelligent spend management services for managers and employees alike, whether they are on the road for weeks at a time or supporting a one-day, off-site event that doesn’t require travel. This acquisition represents a new milestone for HRS Pay as we continue to focus on elevating employee satisfaction.”
Paypense’s employees will officially become HRS Pay employees when the acquisition formally closes in August. Christopher Hecht will join the HRS Pay team as chief product officer, overseeing development and working collaboratively with clients, partners, and employees to enrich HRS Pay solutions moving forward.
Read the full announcement here.
