The Federal Government is unquestionably the largest purchasing organization in the world. Unfortunately, the unique nature of government acquisition poses significant challenges:

• An inordinate number of operational policies, business rules and/or solution constraints must be considered, if not satisfied, prior to making a contract award.
• Intense public and political scrutiny over government contracts require detailed reporting and justification measures.
• Sheer scale and volume of sourcing activities is difficult to manage; literally millions of combined item specifications, supplier bids, and other details to evaluate in award determination.

With such complexity integral to its acquisition activities, the government benefits greatly through the use of optimization-enabled sourcing solutions that enable government buyers to more easily manage the bid collection, analysis, award determination and reporting/justification process.

CombineNet's Advanced Sourcing Application Platform represents a shift in the approach to strategic sourcing, from price consideration to proposal collaboration.

Rather than squeeze supplier margins on bundled items or consolidated contracts, ASAP enables government buyers and their suppliers to reduce costs by driving greater efficiency and innovation into the supply chain. Through Expressive Commerce, buyers and sellers are engaged in a rich, collaborative marketplace where suppliers can offer expressive bids to take advantage of their strengths, passing on significant savings to the buyer. CombineNet ASAP empowers government buyers with optimization capabilities that enable easy analysis of supplier bids against solution constraints, recommending and justifying optimal award scenarios based on objective cost trade-off analysis.