Slow pace of digitisation costing procurement £1.9m a year

Less than half (45 per cent) of procurement processes have been digitised, with paper-based or manual processes costing UK businesses an average of £1.94 million per year, according to new research.

A Vanson Bourne survey of 200 procurement, supply chain and finance professionals for procurement firm Ivalua found that procurement teams are spending almost a third (31 per cent) of their time dealing with analogue processes, with 71 per cent of respondents believing that the rate of digitisation is holding them back from doing their jobs.

A large majority (85 per cent) of respondents also said that procurement in their businesses was less digitally mature compared to other departments, such as marketing, human resources or accounting.

When it came to supplier management, two thirds of businesses admitted they were still reliant on manual and paper based processes, while 45 per cent of purchasing is conducted non-digitally, followed by invoicing (41 per cent) and budget management (39 per cent).

The survey also found that a lack of digitisation limits the time spent on strategic tasks (77 per cent), prevents automation of low-value tasks like invoicing (70 per cent) and prevents teams from getting insights into spend and supplier management (67 per cent).

Overall, the vast majority (97 per cent) of businesses are starting to invest in technology to digitise procurement, with data analytics (67 per cent), cloud-based platforms (62 per cent), artificial intelligence (40 per cent) and digital assistants (40 per cent) being the areas seeing the most focus.

Alex Saric, chief marketing officer at Ivalua said: “Procurement is perfectly placed to help manage this growing risk landscape, support innovation and create sustainable cost savings – however, the lack of digitisation is holding procurement teams back.

“Whilst functions such as accounting and marketing have embraced digitisation and made great strides over time, procurement at most organisations has remained a digital laggard, leaving many businesses unprepared to face today’s rapidly shifting business landscape.”

    Share Story:

Recent Stories


Data trust in the AI era: Building customer confidence through responsible banking
In the second episode of FStech’s three-part video podcast series sponsored by HCLTech, Sudip Lahiri, Executive Vice President & Head of Financial Services for Europe & UKI at HCLTech examines the critical relationship between data trust, transparency, and responsible AI implementation in financial services.

Banking's GenAI evolution: Beyond the hype, building the future
In the first episode of a three-part video podcast series sponsored by HCLTech, Sudip Lahiri, Executive Vice President & Head of Financial Services for Europe & UKI at HCLTech explores how financial institutions can navigate the transformative potential of Generative AI while building lasting foundations for innovation.

Beyond compliance: Transforming document management into a strategic advantage for financial institutions
In this exclusive fireside chat, John Rockliffe, Pre-Sales Manager at d.velop, discusses the findings of Adapting to a Digital-Native World: Financial Services Document Management Beyond 2025 and explores how FSIs can turn document workflows into a competitive advantage.

Sanctions evasion in an era of conflict: Optimising KYC and monitoring to tackle crime
The ongoing war in Ukraine and resulting sanctions on Russia, and the continuing geopolitical tensions have resulted in an unprecedented increase in parties added to sanctions lists.