Thomas Cook chooses IBX for global purchasing

IBX extends the partnership with Thomas Cook. The leading international leisure travel group has decided to rollout IBX eProcurement throughout their entire enterprise. IBX eProcurement is an on-demand purchasing solution based on mySAP SRM (Supplier Relationship Management). IBX delivers the solution in several different languages and thus paves the way for the European wide rollout of IBX eProcurement. With this deal IBX strengthens its position as the leading European provider of services and solutions for efficient purchasing.

The rollout started in Germany at the beginning of 2007 and now Thomas Cook expands the use of IBX eProcurement to other European countries: The rollout in Belgium will start in November 2007. Further countries are planned: both the Netherlands and UK in early 2008. Therefore IBX provides Thomas Cook with several language requirements such as German, English, French and Dutch. Overall approximately 600 employees will use the solution.

“After checking several offers on the market we decided to cooperate with IBX due to its international experience in the entire eProcurement process”, reports Nikolaus Kirner, Vice President Corporate Procurement at Thomas Cook. “Also the cost-benefit analysis has convinced us. Thus we can significantly reduce our procurement costs. Another decisive factor is that it can easily be integrated into our existing SAP environment.”

Streamlining the entire eProcurement process

IBX eProcurement is an on-demand web-based procurement solution based on MySAP SRM. With IBX eProcurement purchasing organisations can streamline the entire procurement process by automating requisition and purchase order generation, minimizing data errors and improving automatic routing of all documentation for approvals and purchase orders. The solution makes the procurement process faster, more cost effective, more user friendly and more responsive. IBX can offer all necessary services for the complete eProcurement rollout including end user training, content refinement and supplier activation.

Thomas Cook will also use the additional operational tools from IBX such as IBX eRequest and IBX Statistics. IBX eRequest is an integrated solution for operational sourcing within the procurement solution. This tool helps the customer to make queries and allows comparing and rating the incoming supplier quotes. IBX Statistics captures all business transactions and presents the data as interactive reports accessible to the user.

“We are very happy about the extended partnership and the important role we play at Thomas Cook. This is another proof that blue chip corporations put trust in IBX solutions as the best product on the market for huge decentralised organisations”, comments Thomas Neubauer, Managing Director at IBX Deutschland. “With the global deal we will be able to continue our expansion in Europe.”