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Emerging procurement technology: data analytics and cognitive analytics

Robert Handfield (Department of Business Management, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina, USA)
Seongkyoon Jeong (Department of Supply Chain Management, WP Carey School of Business, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, USA)
Thomas Choi (Department of Supply Chain Management, WP Carey School of Business, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, USA)

International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management

ISSN: 0960-0035

Article publication date: 16 May 2019

Issue publication date: 28 November 2019

5948

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to elucidate the emerging landscape of procurement analytics. This paper focuses on the following questions: what are the current and future state of procurement analytics?; what changes in the procurement process will be required to enable integration of analytical solutions?; and what future areas of research arise when considering the future state of procurement analytics?

Design/methodology/approach

This paper employs a qualitative approach that relies on three sources of information: executive interviews, a review of current and emerging technology platforms and a small survey of subject matter experts in the field.

Findings

The procurement analytics landscape developed in this research suggests that the authors will continue to see major shifts in the sourcing and supply chain technology environment in the next five years. However, there currently exists a low usage of advanced procurement analytics, and data integrity and quality issues are preventing significant advances in analytics. This study identifies the need for organizations to establish a coherent approach to collection and storage of trusted organizational data that build on internal sources of spend analysis and contract databases. In addition, current ad hoc approaches to capturing unstructured data must be replaced by a systematic data governance strategy. An important element for organizations in this evolution is managing change and the need to nourish an analytic culture.

Originality/value

While the majority of forward-looking research and reports merely project broad technological impact of cognitive analytics and big data, much of it does not provide specific insights into functional impacts such as the impact on procurement. The analysis of this study provides us with a clear view of the potential for business analytics and cognitive analytics to be employed in procurement processes, and contributes to development of related research topics for future study. In addition, this study suggests detailed implementation strategies of emerging procurement technologies, contributing to the existing body of the literature and industry reports.

Keywords

Citation

Handfield, R., Jeong, S. and Choi, T. (2019), "Emerging procurement technology: data analytics and cognitive analytics", International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, Vol. 49 No. 10, pp. 972-1002. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPDLM-11-2017-0348

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited

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