TweetDo you ever wonder why it is that businesses don’t co-operate? Each business operates in isolation making decisions that appear to give themselves the best advantage. But it’s rare that they do get to an optimal position and they are not likely to unless they change the rules of the game. continue reading…

TweetThere has been some criticism of OB10′s user interface and so their users are likely to be pleased at the announcement today of a new version of their portal which, according to the press release, will “enhance the user experience, bring further efficiencies and transparency to the purchase-to-pay process, and deliver ground-breaking new services.” continue reading…

TweetI was excited to read about Alusta last week – the end-to-end framework or platform that Basware have developed for their procure to pay offerings and I was keen to understand a bit more about it when I hooked up with Juha Häkämies VP Market Development, Rowan Lemley, product Marketing Manager and John Webster, VP Global Product Marketing

What is Alusta exactly? Is it the purchase to pay panacea or simply vaporware – a new marketing spin on an old set of products?  Actually a bit of both – but in a good way. continue reading…

TweetBasware have just made a very interesting announcement and launched Alusta, a “cloud-based platform for business-to-business transaction collaboration.” According to their announcement yesterday, Alusta (Finnish for “platform”) provides “open, centralized access to all Basware services via a scalable, secure, open collaborative commerce ecosystem for buying and supplying organizations of every size and location.”

If it lives up to half of the hype, this will be a truly impressive platform.

Alusta isn’t ground breaking. It isn’t even new thinking but what it promises is to bring together a wide set of leading edge tools technologies and techniques to create a purchase to pay platform that could be world beating.

That’s the promise anyway. So what’s it got that’s so impressive? continue reading…

TweetToday, we’re delighted to welcome a guest post from Lars Rolf Jacobsen – Financial Solutions Manager at Tradeshift.

Size matters. Throughout history, it has always been the case that the bigger company in a relationship has all the power. And financial transactions are no exception to this rule.

But the rise of the internet has leveled the playing field in some aspects of business. Now, any small company can use Skype to communicate for free with suppliers and buyers across the world. Whole workforces can be recruited and managed through the web, meaning that talent is cheaper and easier to control. And with e-commerce, any company can market and sell a product to a global audience. continue reading…

TweetLet’s get something straight at the outset. I’m not about to suggest that users of e-invoicing networks will want to use them to play Farmville. But what I can see is that the transactional platforms will become free to use as service providers offer other value added services and I want to explain why. continue reading…

TweetReady for the new year, Patrick Harbin has published and amazing 50 ways to reduce costs in accounts payable.  They say about new year’s resolutions that you should ensure they are achievable so for those that think 50 major change management  programs in one year – that’s 1 per week – is a little too much, you might want to consider the first 5 because we think the first 5 are the best 5. continue reading…