Client Overview
A large European manufacturing group operates multiple production plants across regions, each running its own sourcing initiatives and category strategies. Procurement teams relied heavily on dozens of independent Excel trackers to manage projects, savings forecasts, and supplier negotiations.
As sourcing volume increased, leadership struggled to maintain confidence in reported savings and pipeline progress.
The Challenge
The organization faced growing complexity and risk in its procurement operations:
- Highly fragmented tracking
Each plant and category team maintained separate Excel files with different structures and update cycles. - Low confidence in forecasts
Savings projections were inconsistent, outdated, and difficult to validate across plants. - Slow weekly reporting
Preparing leadership updates required days of manual consolidation and reconciliation. - Limited collaboration
Teams lacked a shared view of initiatives, causing duplication, delays, and missed synergies.
Leadership needed a unified system that preserved familiar workflows while delivering transparency, accuracy, and speed.
The Solution
A centralized procurement pipeline platform was deployed, carefully designed to mirror the team’s existing Excel processes while adding real-time intelligence and collaboration.
Key capabilities delivered:
Unified Excel-Style Pipeline (New)
A single procurement pipeline was built using the same fields, stages, and terminology used in existing trackers.
This enabled rapid adoption without changing how teams worked.
Real-Time Cross-Plant Collaboration (New)
All plants and category teams now operate in one live environment with:
- Shared initiative tracking across regions
- Clear ownership and status visibility
- Instant updates without file transfers
Executive Dashboards & Forecast Visibility (New)
Live dashboards restored leadership confidence by showing:
- Aggregated savings forecasts by plant and category
- Pipeline health and slippage risks
- Progress against annual targets
AI-Powered Weekly Summaries (New)
Automated AI summaries now generate weekly reports covering:
- Savings realized and forecast changes
- Delayed or at-risk initiatives
- Category and plant performance
Manual reporting cycles were eliminated.
Forecast Accuracy Improvements (Improved)
With structured data and live updates, forecast accuracy improved and surprise slippage was significantly reduced.
Implementation Timeline
- Week 1: Field mapping from Excel, pipeline configuration, and data migration
- Week 2: Dashboard setup, AI summary activation, team onboarding, and governance rules
The full rollout was completed without disrupting active sourcing initiatives.
Results & Impact
Within weeks, the manufacturing group achieved:
- A single unified procurement pipeline across all plants
- Real-time collaboration replacing dozens of spreadsheets
- Higher forecast accuracy with fewer last-minute surprises
- Faster weekly leadership reporting through automated summaries
- Restored executive confidence in savings delivery
Procurement shifted from fragmented tracking to controlled, enterprise-wide execution.
Key Takeaway
By modernizing legacy Excel workflows into a unified, intelligent pipeline, the manufacturing group regained control, improved forecast reliability, and enabled true cross-plant collaboration — without changing how teams worked.
