Is Eastern Europe becoming the new China? As business decision become based partly on environmental policies, the case for a low cost European supply base has become one potential differentiator in a market where environmental costs are factored into the price of purchased goods, state Hans Ahlinder, CEO IBX Group.

Following two major contracts with British clients, IBX has now set up a new office in Oxford, United Kingdom with the intention of building a strong presence in the British market. We welcome Mark Masterson who will take on the assignment of Vice President of Sales within MU Europe, primarily focusing on the UK market.

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/Eva Svensson

In the beginning of May 2007, IBX hosted the sixth annual Purchasing Executive Summit to great response from the participants. Over 100 purchasing executives from across Europe gathered in Munich to network and exchange views on the state of purchasing today.

The event featured industry highlights provided by SEB and Vodafone which emphasized purchasing transformation as key success factor for efficient purchasing. Also presenting best practice in purchasing was Deutsche Post World Net, Ericsson, Fazer Group, Helse Øst, IKEA IMS, Linde Gas, Novo Nordisk and Volvo Group NAP.

In an era where low cost country sourcing has been the focus for the purchasing community world wide, nearly 75% of all global trade is carried over the seven seas. But recent reports on climate change and the impact of the carbon economy that facilitates the global trade has put environmentalism on the agenda for many global corporations. And that agenda will certainly have an impact on purchasing.

IBX have entered into a two-year agreement with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). By working together with IBX, the accounting company expects substantial savings, shorter lead times and a fast return on investment.

PwC decided to work with IBX because of their international expertise in all processes of efficient purchasing. IBX will support PwC in the roll-out and operation of IBX complete web-based on demand procure-to-pay solution based on MySAP SRM.

This summer, Europe’s leading CPO summit the BME organized European Procurement Excellence (EPE) is held in Frankfurt on June 13-14. The annual event will focus on improving cost efficiency in order to generate better margins and among the purchasing executives speaking on this subject will be:

• Michael Croon, CFO at IKEA IMS
• Dr Hugo Eckseler CPO at Deutsche Post World Net
• Morten Munkgaard Director Global Procurement at LEGO
• Johanna Hagelberg CEO at NCC Global purchasing Group

Following two major contracts with British clients, IBX has now set up a new office in Oxford, United Kingdom with the intention of building a strong presence in the British market.

In the Oxford office, Mark Masterson will take on the assignment of Vice President of Sales within MU Europe, primarily focusing on the UK market. Mr. Masterson brings long international experience in executive sales, and will definitely contribute to IBX and IBX customers throughout Europe. To build the UK professional services organization, Leif Bohlin and Farzin Saber will take on the responsibilities as acting professional services managers for Source and Procure in UK respectively. Both are actively recruiting for the IBX organization.

IBX United Kingdom
IBX (UK) Ltd
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267 Banbury Road
Oxford OX2 7HT, UNITED KINGDOM

Telephone: +44 1865 339 349
Fax: +44 1865 339 350