Technology Magazine June 2020 | Page 61

right skills must be in place to make proper use of it , such as data scientists , AI specialists , category experts and IT professionals . Finally , moderating the interaction of people and technology should be comprehensive and continuously reviewed policies and procedures ensuring that understanding is continually maintained .

While such digital procurement efforts can be traced back to the 1980s , a far more recent trend involves cloud procurement software , decentralising the business of procurement and transforming the ways in which the activity is costed thanks to softwareas-a-service ( SaaS ) models .

While different procurement solutions and platforms have the same aim of maximising productivity , different providers may have different specialties , techniques and software . A look at offerings from some of the largest companies elucidates this point .

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