What is / Who are Proactis?

Blog updated on 30th March 2022 by Tye Howitt

Proactis has been helping its customers control spend and transform source-to-pay processes for more than 25 years. Today, Proactis is a cloud-based system that allows you to streamline and control every aspect of purchasing and spend from supplier management, contract management and sourcing through to purchasing, touchless invoice processing and online staff expenses.

Proactis serves over 1,000 enterprise clients and a network of 2 million suppliers. Their solutions are currently used daily by over 3 million people in 100+ countries.

What is Proactis used for?

Proactis provides a "comprehensive family of tailored solutions built around core concepts and capabilities derived from real-world experience combined with leading edge technologies". Its end goal is to help you "Transform your Source-to-Pay processes; save money and create efficiency gains while increasing compliance and reducing risk".

Its solutions can be analysed into two broad families of product, covering Source-to-Contract and Purchase-to-Pay.

Source-to-Contract

Procurement, often referred to as eProcurement and Source-to-Contract, is more than simply purchasing products and services at the most favourable price and the best quality. Proactis cloud-based Procurement solutions give Purchasing professionals the tools they need to support and manage the purchasing process right across their businesses. Most importantly, they help the Purchasing team streamline operations and drive added value through effective supplier adoption, evaluation, and communication. The benefits available are significant, and include:

• Gain full control of the supplier lifecycle and enrich eProcurement with state of the art supplier relationship management tools
• Achieve greater value from direct and indirect spend through your sourcing processes
• Drive maximum value from every supplier contract with the contract management system
• Empower staff to secure the goods and services they need to do their jobs, and ensure they are sourcing from approved suppliers

Purchase-to-Pay

Purchase-to-Pay is a term used to describe the end-to-end buying process, from initial request and online approval through to invoicing and payment for good/services received. By simplifying and streamlining these processes, you can take a big step towards your digital transformation goals.

Purchase-to-Pay systems consist of a number of essential P2P processes:

• Buying - Requisitioning, approval, ordering and receiving, while preventing unauthorised purchases to maintain control
• Budget Management - Real-time insight into budgets with clear dashboards and reports for complete budget control
• Invoicing - Automated invoice registration, validation, matching and payment approval for PO and non-PO invoices

With these processes integrated into a single cloud-based P2P platform , the entire process becomes automated, collaborative and streamlined, carries a complete audit trail, and captures purchase history for later spend analysis. The benefits of using such a platform include:

• Achieve greater control and visibility of your spend
• Transform your Accounts Payable function, while cutting cost and complexity
• Turn Accounts Payable into a source of income, with an innovative Accelerated Payment facility
• Gain control of “after-the-event" purchase claims with an integrated Expenses and corporate card solution
• Improve your procurement process for every member of your staff, by giving them the tools to check on the status of their own orders, in a user-friendly environment.

Future Plans

Proactis has always been at the forefront of constant improvement and evolution. From cost pipeline visibility, guided-buying, machine-learning, and compliance controls to early payment functionality. Proactis have continued to innovate and have always listened to the needs of the market.

Covid-19 continues to impact our lives, disrupt supply chains, and increase financial pressure on organisations everywhere. At the same time, climate change, economic uncertainty, geopolitical tensions, and other global issues are putting immense strain on organisations to look carefully at the way they source and purchase goods and services.

Proactis have a keen focus on these developments and are investing further in their platforms and solutions to ensure they continue to deliver the most intelligent, transparent, and best value solutions available.

We can help

LAKE is the UK's number 1 Proactis reseller partner and has been implementing Proactis solutions for almost two decades.

We believe that our customers should have access to world class cloud solutions that are intuitive, scalable and secure. We empower customers through the use of cloud technologies to automate processes, connect ecosystems, analyse performance, and improve future outcomes.

To find out how LAKE Proactis solutions could help you control and streamline your spend, please get in touch via the LAKE website or call me now on 0113 273 7788.

by Tye Howitt

Blog Contributor.